A nonpartisan state report issued Monday said incarcerated people who participated in education programs run by the Virginia Department of Corrections were less likely to be rearrested after release. They also were more likely to find employment and earn a higher wage than those who weren’t enrolled in classes.
About 20% of people in VADOC custody take part in adult education, career training or postsecondary programs — though as many or more people were on waitlists to access the programs.
“Despite these long wait lists, we found that DOC does not consider inmates' recidivism risk and assess educational needs when making educational program enrollment decisions,” said Drew Dickinson, chief legislative analyst at the Joint Legislative Audit & Review Commission.
He also noted that lowering recidivism rates is one of the department’s goals.
The JLARC study was based on interviews with prison staff, incarcerated people, visits to six facilities and the review of national data.
Dickinson pinpointed instructor vacancies, “frequent transfers” and “a lack of connection with job opportunities” as being among the issues VADOC’s programs faced. But between 2022 and 2024, the number of incarcerated people who earned a GED increased from 117 to 544.
VADOC Director Chadwick Dotson spoke following the presentation and agreed with a range of the findings and recommendations — including the need for additional internet access. He also said the department’s education programing would better serve the incarcerated population if additional funding was available to expand the space used for instruction.
The report found per-person funding had increased 22% since Fiscal Year 2019, when adjusted for inflation. JLARC indicated that the change can in part be attributed to a decline in the number of people in VADOC custody.
Virginia prisons currently run on a $1.5 billion annual budget and house about 22,000 people. For context, the FY26 budget for the city of Charlottesville, where around 45,000 people live, is $265 million.
This report, provided by Virginia Public Radio, was made possible with support from the Virginia Education Association.