Mass incarceration as led to over 2 million adults inside prisons at taxpayer cost of about $80 billion per year, and fracturing families. The 2.7 million children with a parent inside, and the 7 million with a parent under court supervision, will be less likely to fall into their parents' criminal patterns once the culture recognizes the value of prison education. This book advocates for their rights, and for programs that prepare offenders for reentry from the moment they begin serving time. Unlocking Minds in Lockup: Prison Education Opens Doors, is designed for general readers, criminal justice professionals, teachers and sociologists. Readers see offenders learning to use critical thinking as part of reconsidering their crime-related behavior. They see felons become students who fill in their education gaps and learn job skills, parenting skills and personal responsibility. They see the racial inequality that exists inside prisons in this country, and discover the humanity in those who have been convicted of felonies and locked up. The U.S. has 5-percent of the world's population and 25-percent of the world's prisoners. It's time for every citizen to learn what can be done to reverse the mass incarceration trend.
