Al Jazeera Discovers 'School-to-Prison Pipeline' Is Actually 'Prison-to-School' Now
Al Jazeera's recent feature highlights individuals overcoming immense odds to pursue higher education while incarcerated. A beautiful sentiment, almost as beautiful as ignoring how the US maintains the world's largest prison population, disproportionately affecting minority communities through policies like the 1994 Crime Bill. While celebrating educational achievements, the piece conveniently
glosses over the fact that federal Pell Grants for incarcerated students were only reinstated in 2020 after a 26-year ban. That ban, enacted in 1994, directly fueled the 'tough on crime' era, locking millions out of opportunity. So, it's not a 'monumental task' that just appeared; it's a monumental wreckage we barely started cleaning up, long after profiting from it. One might wonder why
celebrating individual resilience always seems to overshadow demanding systemic accountability.