Education & Recidivism in Texas Prisons

As the prison population in the United States hit record levels in 1998 (the latest full year for which such data have been announced), 1,252,830 persons sentenced to more than one-year were incarcerated. Thus, nearly one-half of one-percent (actually .0046) of the total population was in prison. Approximately 600,000 more persons were incarcerated in jails serving sentences of one-year or less (Bureau of Criminal Justice Statistics, 1999). A total of 144,510 persons, serving sentences of one-year or more, were incarcerated in Texas in 1998. In Texas, therefore, almost three-quarters of one-percent (actually .0073) of the total population was in prison (Bureau of Criminal Justice Statistics, 1999).

Texas has a thriving prison-industrial complex, wherein private prison operators, construction companies building prisons, and the Texas Department of Criminal Justice (the state's largest department with 39,000 employees and an annual budget of $2 billion) are profiting handsomely. The majority of the population in Texas supports the policies that are filling new prison cells as fast as they can be built. Nevertheless, Texas legislators (Republicans and Democrats alike) are wringing their collective hands over the rising recidivism rateù53 percent in 1992, which was the last time the Texas Department of Criminal Justice made such a determination (Brown, 1998). A private organization, the Texas As

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rcerated persons in the United States, however, 40 percent of prisoners are functionally illiterate, while and astounding additional 19 percent are completely illiterate (The Center on Crime, Communities, & Culture, 1997). These data, while not directly providing information on the relationship between recidivism and education, most certainly reflect a strong relationship between incarceration and education. Flanagan (1994) concluded that adult basic education programs in prisons are very effective in reducing recidivism among participants. This study was based on data from the Texas corrections system for 1991-1992. Harer (1994) found that the higher the level of education a prisoner had at the time of incarceration, the lower was the probability of recidivism. Recidivism rates also were found to decrease in relation to the amount of education prisoners received while in prison. This study was based on data from the federal prison system for 1987. Jeffords and McNitt (1993) found that prisoners who had received a General Education development (GED) certificate while in prison had lower recidivism rates than did comparable prisoners who did not receive a GED while in prison. This study did control for demographic, behavior
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Approximate Word count = 2792
Approximate Pages = 11 (250 words per page)

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