Students in Indiana Women's Prison earn degrees at Marian University through the Women's College Partnership, (Brandon Wright, Courtesy of the Women's College Partnership)
Miles Folsom took the stage at Holy Cross College in May 2022, selected as valedictorian. The college awarded Folsom a medal, and he decided to accept it with one condition.
“I decided to accept it on behalf of everyone else who ever thought that the door was shut, and there was not a way out,” Folsom said.
Folsom was sent to prison as a teenager, and he said his “uphill climb” began with self-education. He kept his father’s words in his mind every time he veered off course: “You have to go to college.”
Eight years into his incarceration, Folsom began college with Holy Cross College and the University of Notre Dame through the Moreau College Initiative. A few years after that, Folsom was released early, and he took his last semester at Holy Cross.
“My college experience is not necessarily the most prominent point when I reflect back on my education, but it's certainly the crowning achievement,” Folsom said.
Now, Folsom is CEO of Invested Youth, and he runs it with his “brother” Colt Lundy. The two met as teenagers while at Wabash Valley Maximum Security Prison. They use Invested Youth to put people with lived experiences into conversations about incarceration.
Folsom also serves as director of outreach for the charity Freedom 22, helping create better legal defenses with Defense Maps. He’s now involved in construction too, and he’s been looking for an architect to build the world’s most humane prison.
“I do think back on my prison experience, my Holy Cross experience, the Moreau College Initiative, all the volunteer work I've done,” Folsom said. “To be honest, I mean, it's uncanny. … It's almost like I'm talking about someone else's life.”
College students in prison were banned from receiving Pell Grants in 1994.
But in 2015, the grants were brought back for a select group of prison education programs as the Second Chance Pell experiment. The Moreau College Initiative was one of about 200 programs across the nation selected for the experiment. More than 40,000 students like Folsom could take college courses because of the Pell Grant. The experiment ended in 2022.
Congress voted to reinstate Pell Grant use for incarcerated students, and that went effect last summer. But to be eligible for Pell funds, they must attend a program approved by the state and then by the U.S. Department of Education.
Today, prison education and correctional leaders in Indiana are making progress toward approval, believing these programs will benefit those in and out of prisons.
Pell Grants are worth up to $7,395, and they’re reserved for undergraduate students with exceptional financial need.
“It really is the only way that programs like this can be sustainable long-term,” said Justin McDevitt, a director with the University of Notre Dame’s Programs for Education in Prison in the Center for Social Concerns.
Education leads to rehabilitation and safer communities
Education and employment are the biggest factors in reducing recidivism, said John Mather, Indiana Department of Corrections Executive Director of Programs and Reentry Readiness.
Research shared by the Indiana Commission on Higher Education shows people in prison are less likely to have a high school diploma and even more unlikely to have a college degree. But their odds of finding employment and staying out of prison again rise when they participate in education programs.
Giving people in prisons an opportunity to educate themselves will make the whole state better and Indiana’s communities safer, Mather said.
“They're going to come back in our communities,” Mather said. “They're going to be your neighbors. They're going to shop at the same places that you shop, their kids are going to go to school with your kids.”
The Department of Corrections and the Commission for Higher Education partnered up to review proposals for Pell funding.
Mather said the team wants to approve programs that are useful for formerly incarcerated people. They researched the most sought-after degrees in Indiana and already established programs.
“And that's kind of our role is to say, you know, ‘Is this sustainable inside of our facilities? Is it in the best interest of the student?’” Mather said.
Watch: PBS: Prisoners will soon be eligible for federal education grants
Then, the Department of Education must approve the prison education programs for Pell funding. The first program, at Cal Poly Humboldt, was approved in January.
“The commitment to the democratization of education on the inside with our students who are incarcerated is also a commitment to the flourishing of our communities on the outside,” Michael Hebbeler, managing director of Notre Dame’s Programs for Education in Prison, said.
Hebbeler said standards for Pell funding are high. Programs must offer reentry support and career development.
Notre Dame’s flagship programs — Moreau College Initiative and the Women’s College Partnership — already offer those, Hebbeler said.
“We know that that's an essential part of this work of college and prison,” Hebbeler said.
A look into college in prison
Notre Dame Prison Education Programs provide liberal arts education, and eligible incarcerated students can earn associate and bachelor’s degrees.
McDevitt directs the Women’s College Partnership. It’s a collaboration between Notre Dame, Marian University and the Indiana Women’s Prison. The program’s goal is to recreate the college experience within the confines of a prison.
Students attend classes full time at no cost to them.
“They're incredible students who just need the opportunity, the way that students on the outside would,” McDevitt said.
At the start of the last academic year, about 40 students enrolled, he said. The classrooms are a co-circular space, and program leaders give students similar experiences, choices and resources to those at other college campuses.
They go to orientation, get a schedule and receive free books and supplies.
“Imagine having an entire college but with 40 students in two classrooms over the course of the week,” McDevitt said.
Folsom took classes with the Moreau College Initiative — a partnership with Notre Dame, Holy Cross and Westville Correctional Facility. About 85 men were enrolled in the program at the start of the last academic year.
Folsom said students could walk and talk freely. There were libraries, a computer lab, and even yoga classes. He couldn’t have asked for a better setting.
“The program was given a whole floor of a building,” Folsom said. “That was very important because it was like a sanctuary.”
Building on Indiana’s legacy of prison education
Indiana’s prison education was robust, Mather said, thanks to IDOC’s former Director of Education John Nally. Nally helped establish experimental Pell Grant sites in Indiana.
Mather said IDOC hopes to expand college education efforts. In addition to Notre Dame, Marian and Holy Cross, Indiana Wesleyan University and Indiana Tech have programs in prisons around the state.
“The goal is to be able to offer post-secondary prison education programs at every one of our adult facilities,” Mather said.
And McDevitt said Indiana was a leader in prison education for decades.
In the early 2000s, people inside Indiana prisons received about 1,000 degrees a year. But Pell funding was pulled in 1994, and then state funding went away too in 2011.
“The number of programs cratered,” McDevitt said. “Notre Dame and Holy Cross and Marian are sort of this renaissance, essentially — a building back from the ashes of this big program and this big statewide network.”
Now that Pell Grants are back, McDevitt said these funds will not only support students, but also college educators and staff who run the programs.
McDevitt and Hebbeler agree that building up quality relationships, earning trust and receiving funding could take years for some programs.
“It will be a slow, deliberate, careful process,” McDevitt said.
Aubrey is our higher education reporter and a Report For America corps member. Contact her at aubmwrig@iu.edu or follow her on X @aubreymwright.
