Prisoners Education Trust
Since 1989, Prisoners Education Trust has been providing access to broader learning opportunities for prisoners, to enhance their chances of building a better life after release.
We do this through a grants programme which assists over 2,000 prisoners each year to study distance learning courses in subjects and levels not available in prison. We also provide advice and support, and we make the case for improving policy and practice.
Prisoners’ Education Trust provides, supports and argues the case for educational opportunities for prisoners. Initially provision focused on access to distance learning as a convenient way for students to study in prison, but our work has expanded beyond the Access to Learning programme to meet a range of learner needs. We have now developed other important programme areas including:
- an advocacy programme, Learning Matters, promoting the importance of education to key stakeholders and enabling prisoner learners to have a voice.
- a peer mentoring project providing prisoners with a qualification to build employment potential, and helping to create a learning culture in prisons.
- a resettlement project providing soon-to-be-released prisoners with a small bursary and mentoring support in the first six months after release.
Our vision is that every prisoner has the opportunity to benefit from education. Education has the power to transform people and enable them to make different choices to those which may have defined their lives previously. Learning and progression in learning are crucial elements in the process of change which leads offenders away from further crime. It forms an important part of the pathway to resettlement and possible employability.www.prisonerseducation.org.uk