Unlock Higher Education was born out of a strong need to center the voices and leadership of formerly incarcerated scholars and professionals to the forefront in matters of advocacy, public education, and policy reform at the local, state, and federal levels. We believe that higher education creates pathways to financial stability and increased opportunity.
In 2020, the steering committee of the Unlock Higher Ed coalition began to carefully consider how to build upon our collective successes in 2019.
However, COVID was just beginning to impact the world. Unlock Higher Ed and our allies and partners, watched as higher education in prison programs across the nation scrambled to deal with its impact. Some institutions completely and abruptly ended all educational programs which some were able to transition to correspondence courses for a short time. We heard from our students who were feeling the loss of contact with professors and academic community members.
We then had to pivot our efforts as it seemed even more pressing that we uplift the importance of higher education programming in prisons and continue to our push for federal and state legislation to support these programs even in pandemic times.
In 2022 and looking ahead, our primary focus will be to build and increase our membership and network across the nation to continue our efforts.
Contact us for more information at [email protected]
However, COVID was just beginning to impact the world. Unlock Higher Ed and our allies and partners, watched as higher education in prison programs across the nation scrambled to deal with its impact. Some institutions completely and abruptly ended all educational programs which some were able to transition to correspondence courses for a short time. We heard from our students who were feeling the loss of contact with professors and academic community members.
We then had to pivot our efforts as it seemed even more pressing that we uplift the importance of higher education programming in prisons and continue to our push for federal and state legislation to support these programs even in pandemic times.
In 2022 and looking ahead, our primary focus will be to build and increase our membership and network across the nation to continue our efforts.
Contact us for more information at [email protected]