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

Short on time? Here are the highlights:

• Illinois waitlists are outpacing seats. The college waitlist has grown 80% since last year, with 3,700 people waiting and 2,600 enrolled. Read my full story, published with WBEZ Chicago's Prisoncast!

• Wisconsin's prisons hit a record population, straining access to programs, reports our partner Wisconsin Watch.

• Delaware Tech is ending its prison education program after graduating current students, reports the Delaware News Journal.

• ICYMI: An update on Dell Pippins, a Ph.D. student who received clemency in 2023 and is now teaching sociology at an Iowa community college.

• Check out the latest print issue of College Inside, published in August.

Educational waitlists in Illinois prisons continue to grow

Access to college classes in Illinois prisons is falling further behind demand, even as the state makes progress getting people into GED and literacy programs. That's according to data published by the Illinois Department of Corrections at the beginning of September.

The number of people on educational waitlists significantly exceeds the number taking classes. Since last year, the number of people on the waitlist for college classes has increased by 80%.

Around 2,600 out of the approximately 30,000 people incarcerated in Illinois are enrolled in higher education, while another 3,700 are on a waitlist, according to IDOC.

"That's a pretty powerful indication that the challenge isn't a lack of interest in education — it's our capacity to meet that interest," said Ashton Klekamp, policy and research director at the Education Justice Project at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, which offers college classes at Danville Correctional Center.

The state's enrollment figures include both college classes and career and technical education, as well as around 750 people on supervised release — Illinois' version of parole. It's unclear if those on supervised release are studying at outside colleges, or if they are enrolled in programs behind bars.

This is the second year Illinois has published this data. In 2023, lawmakers passed legislation requiring the Illinois Department of Corrections to publish detailed data each year about enrollment, waitlists and spending on educational programs. It's one of the few states that require corrections departments to publicly report such data.

Who’s studying behind bars in Illinois

White people are significantly overrepresented in higher education relative to the overall prison population, while Black and Hispanic people are underrepresented. White people make up over a third of the prison population but nearly half of those studying. Black people, by contrast, make up more than half of the prison population but only 43% of higher education participants. Hispanic people make up 13% of the prison population but only 10% of participants.

About 160 women are enrolled in prison higher education programs here, and their enrollment is roughly the same as their share of Illinois’ prison population. However, the number of women participating in education declined by about a quarter since last year.   

The average person enrolled in higher education is 39 years old with about 4.4 years left on their sentence — consistent with the state’s practice of prioritizing people closest to release for educational programming.

“For a long time … we didn’t have a sense of where that access existed and who didn’t have access,” Klekamp said. “The demographic data is something that is really important…People are telling us very clearly that they want an education. The question for Illinois is whether we’re willing to build the capacity to meet that demand.”

Read the full story, published in partnership with WBEZ Chicago.

Related coverage:
++ A look (and listen) inside the dreaded prison education waitlist
++ The waiting game

Record crowding in Wisconsin prisons squeezes program access

Wisconsin's prison population reached a record 23,854 people in late August, nearly 6,000 above the system's intended capacity, reports Natalie Yahr of our partner Wisconsin Watch. The story notes that crowding can increase competition for limited spots in education, treatment and work programs meant to prepare people for release. Many people already wait months or years for those opportunities, and advocates say more crowding could keep people in prison longer. The state is short about 658 correctional officers and sergeants, and earlier Wisconsin Watch reporting found that a 2023 officer shortage led Waupun Correctional Institution to cancel programs and confine people to their cells for months. At Taycheedah Correctional Institution, a peer support specialist said the prison can't hire more peer specialists because converting space to dorms has left no room for them to work. Wisconsin Watch also runs a weekly tracker of the state's prison population.

Delaware community college to end the state’s only degree program behind bars

Delaware Technical Community College is ending its Second Chance Pell program in the state's prisons, report Kelly Powers and Xerxes Wilson of the Delaware News Journal. The move will leave incarcerated Delawareans with no option to earn a college degree outside of mail-based correspondence courses. The virtual program began as a pilot in 2021 and expanded to all four state facilities, and this spring the college's prison programs were approved by the federal Education Department to offer Pell Grants. But the college cited the staffing and coordination needed to run it, and said cohorts had to move through courses together, leaving no capacity to enroll new waves of students. The college says it will graduate those already enrolled. It later told the reporters that 17 students remain enrolled, 54 have been released or left the program, and five have graduated. The Department of Correction says it remains open to new higher education partnerships.

Resources

Ithaka S+R has released a playbook and a standalone workbook to help colleges and community organizations build partnerships that support formerly incarcerated students. The authors developed them with a cohort of 10 college programs and 10 community groups. They cover finding partners, setting shared goals, reviewing campus policies that create barriers, and planning for sustainability.

The Cornell Prison Education Program is opening its Partnership for the Advancement of Prison Education Research, or PAPER, to researchers studying prison education. Launched in April and funded by a $1.5 million Ascendium grant, it will offer a newsletter, a private LinkedIn group, twice-yearly webinars, and an annual in-person convening. Researchers can reach the team at [email protected].

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.

We know that not everyone has access to email, so if you’d like to have a print copy College Inside sent to an incarcerated friend or family member, you can sign them up here. We also publish the PDFs of our print newsletter on the Open Campus website.

There is no cost to subscribe to the print edition of College Inside. But as a nonprofit newsroom, we rely on grants and donations to keep bringing you the news about prison education. You can also donate here.

Interested in reaching people who care about higher education in prisons? Get in touch at [email protected] or request our media kit.

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