A biweekly newsletter about education and employment during and after incarceration. Written by Open Campus national reporter Charlotte West.

This month I'm reporting from Chicago, where I had the chance to collaborate with my colleagues at Prisoncast!, our local newsroom partner WBEZ's statewide radio show and journalism project made with and for people incarcerated in Illinois and their loved ones. Our story was part of a special two-hour Prisoncast! broadcast focused on education, which also includes reporting from the National Conference on Higher Education in Prison in Cleveland earlier this month.

The story, produced by Lauren Frost, looks at criminal history background checks in college admissions — a practice at roughly three out of four colleges and universities nationally, including 10 of Illinois' 12 public universities. The research shows that the campus safety justification universities typically offer isn't well-supported by evidence — and that simply having the question on an application discourages people from applying at all. A 2015 national study found that 60% of undergraduate students with criminal histories stopped filling out applications when they encountered the question.

Mike Pierce knows that feeling. Pierce earned his bachelor's degree while incarcerated at an Illinois state prison, and when he neared the end of his sentence he knew exactly what he wanted to do next: go to graduate school at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, the same school whose professors taught him while he was inside.

But when he filled out his application, there was a surprise waiting at the end — a note asking anyone with a criminal history to contact an office on campus. What Pierce didn't know was that his disclosure would trigger a separate review by a committee that includes law enforcement, campus housing and representatives from the provost's office — a group that can recommend barring someone from admission, regardless of how academically qualified they are for their program.

The letter came on a Friday night, four days before Christmas.

"I was wearing a button-up shirt, black tie, getting ready to go serve and bus tables in a five-star restaurant," Pierce said. "I may have shed a few tears in a stairwell by myself when I read it."

The committee recommended his application be denied. He had 10 days to appeal.

Last month, the issue came up again after a shooting on the campus of Old Dominion University in Norfolk, Virginia. Virginia is one of a handful of states that bars public colleges from asking applicants about their criminal history — but that protection doesn't extend to enrolled students.

Days after a fatal shooting in which the gunman was a student with a prior conviction that had not been disclosed to the university, Old Dominion sent a two-question form to its roughly 24,000 students asking them to disclose their criminal histories. According to WHRO, the university said state law gave it the authority to do so — and the Virginian-Pilot reported that ODU declined to say how many students responded or what it plans to do with the information.

Read the full story at Open Campus, listen to the radio version on WBEZ, or hear the full Prisoncast! education episode.

Northwestern Prison Education Program holds first graduation since Stateville closure

On April 13, the Northwestern Prison Education Program graduated its second class of 22 students — its first ceremony at Sheridan Correctional Center — as graduates received their bachelor’s degrees from Northwestern University.

The graduation came about a year and a half after the program relocated from Stateville Correctional Center, which a federal judge ordered emptied in August 2024 amid deteriorating conditions. Stateville had been home to several college programs, and the abrupt closure scattered students and programs across the state. Northwestern was able to move its program to Sheridan.

The ceremony drew a notable audience, including Lt. Gov. Juliana Stratton, Evanston Mayor and Daniel Biss, Illinois Department of Corrections Director Latoya Hughes, interim and emeritus president Henry Bienen, outgoing provost Kathleen Haggerty and provost-elect Erik Luijten, and featured a commencement address by Bryan Stevenson, founder of the Equal Justice Initiative.

Stevenson, an attorney and law professor who has spent decades representing people on death row and challenging mass incarceration, directed his remarks squarely at the graduates. He told them that by earning a degree from a top university, they were “singing a new song” that the country needed to hear.

“Education is liberation and your freedom is what I want to celebrate this morning,” he said.

Each of the graduates delivered remarks at the ceremony. Two who had already been released also came back inside for the occasion, said Jennifer Lackey, the program’s founding director.

One graduate, Bryan “Ben Israel” Dean, told Open Campus that the journey from his first college class to walking across the stage took about 16 years. He almost walked away from the Northwestern program at one point when he was still at Stateville.

A friend he met through the program made him promise he would finish. When she walked up mid-interview Monday, Dean pointed to her. “She’s the one I thanked in my speech for not letting me quit,” he said. “Education has been the mechanism I’ve used to regain that humanity in myself.”

The program currently has five cohorts at Sheridan and is mid-way through admissions for a sixth, Lackey said. It also has students enrolled at Logan Correctional Center, which is also slated for closure. The program’s first cohort of women at Logan have completed their degrees, though their commencement has not yet been scheduled.

Read the full story.

Let’s connect

Please connect if you have story ideas or just want to share your experience with prison education programs as a student or educator. You can always reach me at [email protected] or on Bluesky, LinkedIn, or Instagram. To reach me via snail mail, you can write to: Open Campus, 2460 17th Avenue #1015, Santa Cruz, CA 95062.

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