Philadelphia City Prison Commissioner Louis Giorla received an unpleasant surprise when the city tested the reading levels of its prisoners. Although the U.S. average reading skill level is at fourth grade for prisoners, Giorla believed his city’s inmate population scored at the sixth to eighth grade levels.* Giorla was stunned to find that over a quarter of Philadelphia prisoners were reading on the same level as second and third graders.
The math level of Philadelphia prisoners was higher, at fifth grade level, but still too low to allow released prisoners to effectively compete in the job market. The combination of substandard math and reading skills serves as a direct pipeline from school to prison, according to the National Center for Fair and Open Testing which discovered that those with poor reading skills often drop out of school, and with no marketable job skills often turn to illegal activities as a means of support. Lower scoring students, according to NCFOT, are often suspended for infractions that higher scoring students are not suspended for, or are given shorter suspensions. Low scoring students are also less likely to be encouraged to stay in school.
Carlos Garcia, Superintendent of the San Francisco Unified School District, recognized the problem of low literacy results almost guaranteeing a future stint in prison when he told the SF K Files:
“Literacy is one of my goals. I want every child in my district to be literate by the end of third grade. If a child is not reading at grade level by third grade, it can have a profound negative impact on his or her future. Twenty-two of our country's states use third grade test results to determine how many prison cells to build for the future.”
Philadelphia, in the meantime, has drawn battle plans to combat the abysmal reading level of the city’s school children in general, and prisoners in particular. An unnamed private donor who previously gave money for educational reentry programs is being asked to contribute again in order to establish new literacy building initiatives. The city’s Department of Behavioral Health and Mental Retardation Services will focus on testing prisoners to detect learning disabilities. Checking to see if inmates really do have a GED or high school diploma is another area the city will look into because the 50 percent self-reported rate of GED or high school completion is now believed to be untrue. And Giorla now wants to revamp educational programs in the city’s prisons to include remedial grade school reading and math lessons, not only GED classes. This approach has the possibility of cutting down on recidivism as the formerly incarcerated return to their communities literate, with more self-esteem. Being able to read and fill out a job application opens the door to being hired. Other cities and states might follow the lead that Giorla and others in the City of Brotherly Love are establishing.
Sources: Philadelphia Inquirer, SF K Files, National Center for Fair and Open Testing
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