For purposes of the National Directory, we define higher education in prison as postsecondary education provided to individuals who are incarcerated or otherwise confined to state or federal custody. To be considered higher education in prison, as opposed to Correctional Education or Adult Basic Education, programming must include:

• coursework designed for individuals who have completed a secondary credential (e.g., diploma, GED)
• affiliation with an accredited college and/or university, and
• requirement of a secondary credential or the use of Ability to Benefit criteria for enrollment.

No.

Yes.

In 2008, the Prison Studies Project at Harvard University began compiling a list of higher education in prison programs throughout the United States. For the next 10 years, the National Directory of Higher Education Programs in Prison remained a central focus of the Prison Studies Project and an important resource for the higher education in prison community. In 2019, the Alliance for Higher Education in Prison partnered with the Research Collaborative on Higher Education in Prison at the University of Utah and the Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley, to continue this work through the distribution of the Annual Survey of Higher Education in Prison Programs and the creation of the National Directory of Higher Education in Prison Programs (2020), which serves as a comprehensive resource for people seeking information about college in prison programs in the United States. In 2025, the Research Collaborative on Higher Education in Prison distributed a census questionnaire to all known programs, inviting them to update their previous directory information. Additionally, anonymous links were sent through a mailing list maintained by the Alliance for Higher Education in Prison and through social media and other communication outlets.

Data for the 2025 National Directory update are drawn from responses to the 2025 National Directory of Higher Education in Prison Programs (n = 172), which were compiled with known program information already existing in the National Directory of Higher Education in Prison Programs (n = 406).

The 2025 census update was designed to encourage greater responses than in previous years as well as capture more specific information about re-entry efforts on campus. This meant that the instrument was shorter (at most, 42 questions) and pre-populated with historical data drawn from existing programs in the National Directory. The 2025 survey attempted to clarify questions including where programming was offered and to whom, what credential pathways were offered, and what additional programming existed for incarcerated and directly impacted students.

Once the survey was completed, additional data were retrieved for programs included in the Alliance for Higher Education in Prison’s National Directory but that did not respond to the 2025 Annual Survey. These data were used to update the National Directory with the most recent information for all known prison education programs.

The National Directory is currently in its third year, with data from the 2022 Annual Survey reflecting the Academic Year 2020-2021.

A complete archive of prior year(s) is available here.

Data reports from each year are available here.

Please fill out this form so that we can contact you to gather information. We value your participation and actively want to make the Directory as accurate and complete as possible.

Yes! The Directory is primarily organized by program, however you can see the list of academic institution names here. For more details about each institution's involvement in higher education in prison, click on the linked program name(s) below each institution.

This means that enrollment at the facility is something other than strictly open enrollment or strictly competitive or merit-based enrollment. Some facilities with this designation may offer a combination of open and competitive or merit-based enrollment models.

This means that the admission cycle at the facility is something other than annually, twice per year, quarterly, or rolling. Some facilities with this designation may offer a combination of admission cycles.

Respondents to the 2022 Annual Survey of Higher Education in Prison Programs were invited to share program documents in order to make them publicly available. A series of common documents were identified and all documents shared under the Creative Commons Attribution: NonCommercial-ShareAlike (CC BY-NC-SA). The documents currently available are: Admissions Application, Annual Reports, Bylaws, Curriculum, Faculty Handbook, FAFSA, MOU, Org Chart, Program Evaluations, Re-entry Guide, Staff Handbook, Strategic Plan, Student Evaluation Form, Student Handbook, Volunteer Handbook. View the document library.

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