Why are prisoners finding it hard to live outside the prison system? After inmates are released from prison, they need to learn how to re enter back into society, but some have no family support or anywhere to go, so they commit another crime and go right back to jail, a phenomenon called recidivism. “Studies show that many offenders tend to end up back in prison when they can’t find employment or if they have strained family” (Chamberlain). Having support is great after being released but not all support is the right support but there are many other options. In fact, there are halfway houses, gate money, the power of an education, and even some ways to find their way back into society while in prison. There are many options for inmates …show more content…
While in prison inmates can apply for the limited pilot program to help with the funds they need to help with their college tuition (Westervelt).“Researchers found that inmates who participate in correctional education programs have 43 percent lower odds of returning to prison than those who do not” (Education). With a college degree, the inmates will have a better chance at getting a job and they will have a better chance of being eligible for parole (Successful Reintegration). “Employment after release was 13 percent higher among prisoners who participated in either academic or vocational education programs than those who did not” (Education). Education in prison can be great for inmates wanting to get a head start on their …show more content…
There is a high percentage of foster care youth that have been in contact with the law after they turned 18. A study shows that “one-third of the former foster care children who were tracked in three Midwest states suffered a “high level” of involvement with the criminal justice system” (What Percentage). California carried out a state survey with the help of California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) and the California Senate Office of Research (SOR); they surveyed 2,564 inmates. Fourteen percent of the inmates said that they have been in foster care at some point in their life. There are many options for foster children to live; they can live with a relative, family friend, foster family, or in a group home. From the inmates surveyed, fifty-one percent of them lived in a group home and two percent lives with his/her family friend. Forty percent of them were in foster care for one to five years while twenty-five percent of the surveyed inmates were in foster care less than a year. When the prisoners left foster care most left when they were prreteens or teenagers. Fifty percent were between the age of thirteen and seventeen years old while eight percent was released when they were under the age of six. But there are many reasons why they left foster care. Some reasons why they leave is because they go live with family friends, they are adopted, reunified with family, sent to a
“About two-thirds of children admitted to public care have experienced abuse and neglect, and many have potentially been exposed to domestic violence, parental mental illness and substance abuse” (Dregan and Gulliford). These children are being placed into foster care so that they can get away from home abuse, not so they can move closer towards it. The foster children’s varied outcomes of what their adult lives are is because of the different experiences they grew up with in their foster homes. The one-third of those other foster children usually has a better outcome in adult life than the other two-thirds, which is a big problem considering the high percentage of children being abused in their foster homes. Although, the foster care system has most definitely allowed children to experience the positive home atmosphere that they need there is still an existed kind of abusive system in the foster care program that is unofficial but seems to be very popular. Foster care focuses on helping children in need of a temporary stable environment; however, foster care can have negative impacts to the children and the people around them concerning the foster child going through the transition, the parents of the foster child, a new sibling relationship, and problems that arrive later influencing the foster child long-term.
This article describes the similarities and parallelism of the foster system to the prison systems and how they perpetuate and are influenced by each other. It describes how these systems commodify and dehumanize these human beings, especially women who receive long, severe sentences for minor offenses and are thus denied ability to parent their child from behind bars. This, thus, affects the child in the short and long term because these children are taken from their mothers by the state, often put into foster care, in which the state then refuses to take care of these motherless children. This then leads to social workers developing more aggressive and hostile tactics when dealing with these types of cases, because often the children must scavenge the streets in order to survive and become troubled by the social realities they face. The author then begins to discuss how the welfare system becomes heavily involved with these families, along with the stigmatizations government assistance is attached with. . It is unfortunate that this article only very briefly discusses pregnant, black incarcerated women, and the lack of prenatal care they are provided with during
The concept of aging out of foster care is referred to those children who are within the state foster care system and who are still in the system upon reaching the age of eighteen, twenty-one or have graduated from high school (Craft, 2014). The causes of children aging out of the foster care system is usually due to the children not finding a permanent home with an adoptive family, or the state for some reason has not reunited the child with his or her birth family before turning of age. Each state has a different regulation on what the age should be when a child ages out of the system. Many children are not ready to make the transition of being out on their own, therefore, some states have moved the age up to 21 years instead of 18 years (Craft, 2014). If the foster parents or parent chooses to keep caring for the child after he or she ages out, then the child is able to stay in their foster home until he or she is ready to make that step and move out. According to Cunningham and Diversi, many of the difficulties that foster youth face during their transition are known and read about in academic literature, but those who go through the process of aging out of foster care are largely missing from the academic literature (Cunningham & Diversi, 2013). Many children who are in the foste...
“FREEZE! Get on the ground”! All the words someone running from the police hears. He fears their presence because he knows that if he is caught he will be sent to one of the many overpopulated prisons in America. There he will struggle with doing everyday tasks due to the enormous numbers located within the prison walls. Prison overpopulation should be an utmost priority on every individuals concerns due to the fact that with this massive increase it negatively affects our legal, social, and economic environment.
In 2007 there were approximately 77,200 fathers and 65,600 mothers incarcerated in the United States (Bureau of Justice Statistics, 2007). As our society continues to grow, our jail and prison population are growing as well. When a parent or guardian is taken into custody the juvenile (child) is taken and released to a relative or child protective services. The children are either given to a close family member or a surrogate parent, meaning a foster home. This may have an emotional impact on the juvenile involved, which may lead them to committing delinquent acts. The children sometimes feel they are left to fend for themselves emotionally and the stress of these emotions are left upon the guardian at the time. These intense sufferings sometimes leave the juveniles in a harmful mental state resembling depression, anxiety, post-traumatic stress disorder and feelings of abandonment from their parents/guardians. Children with incarcerated parents are five times more likely than their peers to commit crimes (Texas Department of Criminal Justice, 2008).
“Six million people are under correctional supervision in the U.S.—more than were in Stalin’s gulags.”
Rehabilitation also involves programs in prisons that have the goal of helping offenders return back to society (Goff, 2014, p.20). Prisons have also put in place programs to assist inmates, “the goal of these release programs are to ease the transition of offenders from the institution into the community while simultaneously promoting stable employment after release” (Cullen & Jonson, 2011, p.309). If a person has been in an institution for a long period of time it is often hard to adjust to life outside, which is why these programs are important in the justice
The amount th of money that has been spend on prisons is about 49 billion dollars the reason for this is because people are being sent to prison and some re offend and come back. The main purpose of going to jail is to never come back , but in some cases others don 't seem to learn from their mistakes. This is the reason why prison education would come in handy. In the article “Education and Vocational Training in Prisons Reduces Recidivism, Improves Job Outlook” its states that “Researchers found that inmates who participate in correctional education programs have 43 percent lower odds of returning to prison than those who do not”This quote is pretty much saying that the percentage of inmates that has education is less likely to come back. This is good because the amount of money that we would be saving would probably help us with debt that we face a lot in american. Education is the most important form of rehabilitation for
The United States criminal justice system constantly violates human rights. These rights belong to justify every person in America and should not be used to tear one another down for what their beliefs are. Likewise, freedom of speech is so ingrained in the constitution that it should be more widely embraced. The protection of religion, speech, and expression is a critical part of America’s political system. The strong, direct link between freedom and democracy is unbreakable and is an important part in governing ourselves. It states that Congress is prohibited in creating laws against people’s belief’s; yet, it is regularly denied to anyone who talks back to the law. Furthermore, this country supports the death penalty. While some individuals
Mass incarceration has put a large eye-sore of a target on the United States’ back. It is hurting our economy and putting us into more debt. It has considerable social consequences on children and ex-felons. Many of these incarcerations can be due to the “War on Drugs”. We should contract the use of incarceration.
Prisons have been around for decades. Keeping housed, those of our society who have been convicted
For many teenagers, their 18th birthday is an exciting time in their lives. They are finally becoming a legal adult, and are free from the rules and restrictions created under their parents. But not all teens feel the same joy about this coming of age. For the hundreds of thousands of children living in foster care in the United States, this new found freedom brings anxiety and fear. Where will they live after turning 18? How will they get the medications they may need? How will they find a job with little to no experience? How will they put themselves through school? Aging out of foster care is a serious issue among America’s youth. Every year, 20,000 children will age out with nowhere to go, being expected to be able to survive on their own (Reilly 728). Young adults face various obstacles upon aging out of foster care, such as multiple health problems/issues, homelessness, and finding/maintaining a job.
This reform idea was first introduced by New York Governor Andrew Cuomo. As an argument for his claim, Woodman shares statistics that show that having a college degree over a high school degree increases a person’s chances of getting hired by 50%. He asserts that if college education were offered to prison inmates, they would gain an edge in the job market, especially since top colleges and universities are not producing graduates for in-demand fields. “[T]hey’re not going to care that your degree is from University of Sing Sing, not University of Phoenix,” he states in relation to North Dakota’s need for engineers. Offering more job opportunities to ex-convicts would give them what Woodman calls an anchor in
This paper explores the benefits provided by educational programs in jails and prisons. Included are the reasons inmates need education in order to successfully reenter society once they are released and use the knowledge and skills they have learned to obtain a job in order to support themselves and their families. Also examined in the paper are the financial benefits of incorporating educational programs instead of cutting them, as well as the effect these programs play on the recidivism rate. Lastly is a focus on understanding the importance of education and job training, even though the recipients are criminals.
Suffering from an addiction is punishment enough, sending drug addicts to jail is not the solution. Addicts are suffering already by not having a place to stay. Most of the time addicts do not remember where their family is located at and they need help to get better.That is why I am saying that addicts should go to rehab instead of prison.