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# Secretary Cardona Holds Virtual Roundtable to Discuss the Importance of Providing Pell Grants for Incarcerated Individuals

# Secretary Cardona Holds Virtual Roundtable to Discuss the Importance of Providing Pell Grants for Incarcerated Individuals

May 25, 2021

**Contact:  **press@ed.gov

                                    -        
This afternoon, Education Secretary Miguel Cardona held a virtual roundtable to showcase the importance of providing Pell Grants for incarcerated individuals by speaking with students and former students who took college courses in prison.

This session allowed the Secretary to hear directly from students who have gone through college in prison programs and provided insight on how we can best serve these students going forward.

Secretary Cardona launched the discussion and listened as the students shared their stories.

“I am so glad to be here to talk with you  today and thank each of you for your willingness to share your stories with me.  College in prison programs have an important mission that I strongly believe  in. I know how important teachers and professors are and the effect they have  in all our life trajectories – and I want more incarcerated adults to have  access to high-quality educational programs while they’re in prison.”

One by one the formerly incarcerated  students shared their stories of education triumph, as well as the many  challenges they faced trying to meet their educational goals.

Daniela Medina, from California, said she  dropped out of high school and eventually was incarcerated. During her  incarceration, she said she earned her GED, which led to her thirst for  education and the longing to bringing something positive back to her family once  she got out of prison.

“Three years before I got paroled, Feather  River College in Quincy, California, came into the prison and said they were  only accepting 60 students out of the 3,000 women who were incarcerated. I was  very fortunate to be one of the chosen,” Medina said.

    Medina said that having the opportunity to  pursue an education while incarcerated filled her with confidence and changed  her perspective about herself.

“I no longer felt like I was just  incarcerated or an incarcerated person,” she said. “I felt like I was a scholar  and part of the student body on a college campus.”

    Medina graduated magna cum laude with a  BASW from UC Berkeley in 2019. She recently graduated with her master’s in  social work from UC Berkeley and was awarded the 2021 Social Welfare Dean’s  Award for Social Justice.

    All the students overwhelmingly agreed  that more resources are needed to help bond colleges with prisons so more  incarcerated individuals have access to quality education.

    Cardona closed the roundtable reaffirming his  commitment to providing Pell Grants for incarcerated students.

“I am inspired by what I've heard today  about the importance of this issue and the continued need for access to Pell  for incarcerated students. I am committed to ensuring that the Department works  to serve currently- and formerly incarcerated students well, and to increasing  access to high-quality post-secondary education for these students.”

The U.S. Department of Education (ED) is  currently running the Second Chance Pell Experiment that allows about 100 colleges to  offer Pell Grants to incarcerated individuals. In the coming years, ED will be  implementing a change Congress made in December 2020 that removes a legislative  ban that prevented incarcerated students outside the experiment from receiving  access to this aid.

    The Biden administration has proposed  historic investments in our education system, including increasing the maximum  Federal Pell Grant by $1400.
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