Image: Gregory Wolniak receives a $350,000 grant through the Prisoner Reentry Institute (PRI). Associate Professor Gregory Wolniak has received a $350,000 grant through the Prisoner Reentry Institute (PRI) at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice to conduct a process and outcomes evaluation of its College Initiative (CI) program. CI promotes access to higher education opportunities for people who have been incarcerated and provides guidance and practical assistance for them to enroll and succeed in college. The program has enrolled more than 1,400 students since 2002. Wolniak is co-PI with Althea Webber, director of research and strategy at the City University of New York, for the two-year study. He looks forward to going beyond usual success measures, such as program completion and employment rates, to uncover sociological and cognitive effects on the students. In their initial RFP, PRI described the anticipated importance and impact of the study, “Findings will enable CI staff to better serve its students, gain a clearer understanding of students’ outcomes by student subgroups, and share valuable lessons learned about out program with other direct service, higher-education reentry organizations.” In addition to an analysis of the administrative data currently collected by PRI, Wolniak and Webber will develop new instruments for gathering meaningful post-program data from past participants. Wolniak expects opportunities for IHE students to assist with the grant to develop in the coming months. Type of News/Audience: General News Research
