Doing What Really Matters: Transforming the potential of prisoners through Higher Education
Doing What Really Matters (DWRM), a social enterprise focused on prisoner rehabilitation through university education, has secured £150,000 in funding. Their goal is to enable 25% of the prison population, equal to 20,000 students, to access Further and Higher Education within the next decade. DWRM is the second recipient of funding from the Growth Impact Fund (GIF). In this blog, we explore why DWRM’s work is so important to addressing systemic inequalities and reducing the rate of prisoners reoffending.
Education for people in prison is also not a small issue. As of 2023, there are almost 85,000 people in prison across England and Wales and the majority of these individuals come from racialised communities. Due to a lack of quality education and social barriers many people are unable to find employment, so what’s the solution? A new kind of education.
The state of the prison education system
Education and the prison system are connected. Studies on the school to prison pipeline have shown how school exclusion can affect someone’s likelihood of becoming incarcerated. When in prison, education still plays an important role in an individual’s likelihood to reoffend, but education in prison is substandard.
Many of us take education for granted, but for those in prison, education can be a lifeline. Data published by the Ministry of Justice has shown that 57% of adult prisoners have literacy levels below those expected of an 11-year-old. But, according to the Ministry of Justice, people who had participated in education whilst in prison were significantly less likely to reoffend within 12 months of release than those who had not by 7.5% points i.e. a reoffending rate of 32.6% from a baseline one-year reoffending rate of 40.1%. Despite the low levels of baseline education and the power of education to change the lives of individuals, and society, the number of prisoners participating in a course equivalent to AS-levels or above showed a 90% decrease compared to the 2010/11 academic year.
“The House of Commons Education Committee in 2016 (The Coates Review) and 2022 recommended that education should be “at the heart of the prison system” but we’ve seen that this hasn’t happened leaving prisoners without basic literacy and digital skills.”
Education as the solution
DWRM Consultants is an organisation dedicated to supporting imprisoned and formerly imprisoned people to find education, employment and training opportunities. DWRM’s Co-Founder Dan Whyte established the company after leaving prison in April 2021 with his co-founder, Ruth McFarlane, an educator and practitioner in the prison education field. Dan achieved undergraduate and postgraduate degrees while in prison and is now studying for a PhD in criminology at the University of Westminster. DWRM is a meaningful way to invest in the long-term structural and institutional challenges faced by prisoners and prison leavers.
They work with prisoners, prisons, universities, and probation services to provide access to university education and as well as support throughout an individual’s journey inside and leaving prison. With £150,000 in funding from the Growth Impact Fund, DWRM will enable 25% of the prison population, equal to 20,000 students, to access Further and Higher Education within the next decade.
A new investment approach
At the Growth Impact Fund (GIF) it’s our mission to support underrepresented founders, and DWRM is a perfect example of this in action. The team has lived experience of the issue they’re addressing, and first-hand knowledge of the solutions that will work.
We worked with DWRM to create their financial model, touching on the root causes of a lack of access to education in prison. We want to model this approach for other organisations, and believe that all social investors should consider lived experience when making investment decisions.
Supporting underrepresented founders through investment
DWRM joins Neuropool as our second investment through the Growth Impact Fund. We’ll be in Manchester to meet more social entrepreneurs who have been previously excluded from investment, if you’d like to join us, register your interest.
The “Growth Impact Fund” is managed by Big Issue Invest Fund Management Ltd (BIIFM). BIIFM is the alternative investment fund manager (“AIFM”) of the Fund and is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FRN: 610618) as a “small authorised UK AIFM” in accordance with article 3(2) of the AIFMD to manage unregulated AIFs. The fund is addressed to professional investors only. Please note that: past performance cannot be relied on as a guide to future performance. The capital of Investors in the Fund is at risk. Any target is not a predictor, projection or guarantee of future performance.
