Note to editors:
We write about the Top 10 Prison Education Programs, which we have been working on for a decade to increase access to higher education for incarcerated people. We find the framing of the article “Prison education may increase risk of reincarceration due to technical violations” (January 12, 2026) misleading and are deeply concerned about its potential impact on incarcerated students and prison education programming.
The article fails to acknowledge decades of evidence on the benefits of prison education. The title and framing deceptively imply that college courses increase post-release criminal activity nationwide. Grinnell’s study is an unpublished working paper based solely on data collected in Iowa. Most impactful for incarcerated students, the title and introductory paragraph mislead readers by suggesting that responsibility for technical violations and reincarceration should be placed on the individuals affected by justice themselves. Hidden within the article is a nuanced, accurate, structured explanation of the data: Incarcerated people in college may be unfairly targeted by parole boards and other decision-making bodies in the correctional system, resulting in higher rates of technical violations, according to Iowa data.
The article’s misleading framing could be devastating for incarcerated college students, especially in an environment where lawmakers often focus on being “tough on crime.”
We understand the importance of journalism telling complete stories, and many of the findings from the Grinnell study may help understand programmatic challenges; however, this particular framing itself may lead to unintended consequences. The abolition of Pell funding in 1994 led to the collapse of nearly 30 years of prison education; as a result, the number of prison education programs in the United States dropped from 772 to 8. Blaming incarcerated people for structural failures could cause colleges and universities to withhold support for their programs. We’ve seen programs, like Georgia State University, collapse without institutional support, leaving incarcerated students unable to attend college. This material threat is further amplified by the article’s premature conclusions about a field that would not begin to rebuild until Pell’s reintegration in 2022.
In a world where incarcerated students are dehumanized every day, it is our collective social obligation to responsibly and equitably present information about humanizing programming. Otherwise, we risk harming students’ fledgling and still fragile access to higher education.
