Mandatory Education Research Paper

It’s Time for Change: It’s Time for Mandatory Education Often, we find ourselves in times of trouble. With nowhere to find comfort, or a sense of identity or a place in society, people tend to fall victim to committing crime. In a moment of weakness or desperation, a human 's life is potentially changed for the entirety of their life on Earth. Sentenced to years upon years in a cold, isolated, uncomfortable cell- only to have their spirits and hopes of a better life one day, completely swept out from under them. Day after day, the prisoner will wake up, eat old bread and drink warm water, be subjected to random body searches and the fear of an inmate brawl in which they are thrown into and soon find their life at risk. Eventually, this lifestyle …show more content…
A main theory of why people commit crimes is due to their lack of stake in the community. In other words, in their minds, they are as good in prison as they are in their community, so they essentially have nothing to lose. A reoccurring issue that fuels the idea of low self worth in a community is due to poor education systems early in life. Amy Roza, a director at Goucher College’s Prison Education Partnership in Maryland says, “Students incarcerated in our prisons are overwhelmingly from communities that have been excluded from quality education and higher education. There’s incredible potential in those students,” (Behind the News). By creating a mandatory education system within the prison for inmates, they will gain knowledge and insight and feel more connected to society. The ability to engage in thoughtful and intelligent conversation will give them a sense of confidence which will then propel them into a higher realm of self worth and hopefully on the track of a higher education or job. Enriching inmates who had not previously had a chance in a good school, or didn 't realize the importance of school, with valuable life skills will reduce the chance of them turning to crime to fill the void. In fact, in a study done by the Christian Science Monitor, “Inmates with at least two years of college education had a 10 percent rearrest rate compared to a …show more content…
There has been the suggestion of Pell Grants for inmates, which are grants essentially paying for a college education for prisoners while they were incarcerated. Undoubtedly, this created a lot of mixed feelings and some argues, “Why should prisoners be given a free college educations?” However, there are not many other options at this point. America and either set up mandatory education within a prison and support the Pell Grants or continue to build more prisons for the growing number of criminals that are sent back to prison after being incarcerated and released. It would be the logical decision to use the money that is being spent to erect new prisons on education programs with books and teachers. As Freerick says, “If you spent 10 or 5 percent of the cost of incarceration on educating these people and giving them a chance in life, wouldn 't that be a smart thing to do?” Freerick’s proposition makes sense and is a logical solution for creating an education system within