Nearly 650,000 adults are released from America’s prisons each year. They return to their communities needing housing and jobs, but their prospects are generally bleak. The majority of returning prisoners have not completed high school. Close to three quarters of them have a history of substance abuse, and more than one third have a physical or mental disability. These former prisoners are going home to some of the nation’s poorest neighborhoods, where they often lack stable social bonds and where there are few supports and services to help them restart their lives.
Given the huge gap between their complex challenges and their limited opportunities for addressing them, it is not surprising that recidivism rates are high. In fact, more than half (52 percent) of former state prisoners are back behind bars within three years after their release, either as a result of a parole violation or because they have committed a new crime.
This cycle of recidivism has layers of negative consequences. Households that are already fragile become overwhelmed. Communities that are already struggling fall further behind. And the lives of those who move in and out of prison are wasted. The cost to taxpayers is enormous. Overall, the US spends more than $60 billion a year on prisons and jails. (It costs more than $23,000 to incarcerate someone in a Federal Bureau of Prisons facility for one year and approximately $3,500 per year for probation; incarceration in a state prison can run as high as $45,000 per year.)
Without the development of effective approaches for reducing recidivism, the problem is certain to grow. The number of Americans behind bars has increased steadily and now includes more than 2.3 million men and women. Almost all of them will eventually be released—and unless something changes, more than half will not be successful in reentering their communities and will return to prison.
Why Include Mentoring in a Reentry Program for Adults?
For more than 10 years, research has demonstrated that carefully structured,well-run mentoring programs can positively affect social, behavioral and academic outcomes for at-risk young people. Research has also shown how mentoring works—through the development of a trusting relationship between the young person and an adult mentor who provides consistent, nonjudgmental support and guidance.
Among the questions to explore was whether mentoring could similarly lead to positive outcomes for adult ex-prisoners. Findings from the evaluations suggest that mentoring may have real benefits in strengthening outcomes in the context of a multifaceted reentry program. Across the many program sites, about half of the participants became involved in mentoring. Those participants fared better, in terms of program retention and
employment, than those who were not mentored. Specifically:
- They remained in programs that help them
- They were more likely to find a job while in the program.
- They were more successful in retaining jobs.
- They were less likely to recidivate.
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