Toney Jennings was illiterate when he was arrested at age 16. In the six months he spent at the Lowndes County Jail in Eastern Mississippi, he says he played basketball, watched TV and "basically just stayed to myself."
A special education student, Jennings qualified for extra help in school. Those services should have carried over to the justice system, but Jennings said he never even attended class while in jail. Now 20, he is still unable to read or write.
Each year, thousands of Mississippi teens cycle through the justice system, where experts say the quality of education is often low. Incarcerated juveniles have the same educational rights as those outside — five hours of instruction a day that meet their learning needs, including special education. The state does not currently track how many of those juvenile offenders are entitled to those extra education services, but according to a 2010 federal survey, 30 percent of youth in custody of the juvenile justice system have a diagnosed learning disability — six times the amount in the general population.
Following several lawsuits, Mississippi has worked to improve the quality of education for all students in the system, with some successes.
Still, many of the kids who need help the most, like Toney, aren't getting it, experts say. These students tend already to be academically behind, and encounters with the justice system early on only increase the likelihood they'll drop out of school or end up incarcerated as adults.
"Every day they're not getting a real education, then that's a day that we've lost," Sue Burrell, a staff attorney at the San Francisco-based Youth Law Center said. "The kids that are in juvenile justice cannot afford to lose those days."
Once arrested, male and female juveniles in Mississippi first go to detention centers to await trial. They can also be sentenced to these facilities for short periods of time. For longer stays – of several weeks or months – youth go to the Oakley Development Center, 30 minutes west of Jackson. All facilities are expected to provide classes on site with certified teachers.
Although centers may monitor the number of special education students that pass through their doors, no state department has collected or analyzed that information. When reporters from The Hechinger Report asked the Mississippi Department of Education and the Office of Public Safety about the number of special education students in detention centers in the state, both agencies said that they believed the other entity was tracking those statistics. The Department of Education said it will track those numbers in the future.
To comply with the federal law that requires extra educational services for any student diagnosed with a disability, a school will create a legal document known as an Individual Education Program (IEP). This might include one-on-one time with a teacher or additional time to complete assignments. A student's right to an IEP extends to juvenile justice and adult correction facilities. But experts around the country say that the legally mandated services these students need are rarely provided once they enter the criminal justice system.
"Kids with special needs are not being served well," David Domenici, director of the Center for Educational Excellence in Alternative Settings, said. "My take is a lot of facilities don't thoughtfully look at the IEP."
Lawsuits bring change
Jennings, now 20, was raised by his grandmother, Cornelia Glenn, in Caledonia, Mississippi, who said he rarely got in trouble as a child. He was diagnosed at age 8 with a learning disability and by the time he was in high school, he was placed in a classroom of only special education students for "behavioral issues" that weren't part of his diagnosis, according to his IEP.
Aware of how far behind he was, Glenn agreed to send him to an alternative school that was recommended by school officials who said the smaller class sizes could help him academically.
In 2010, Jennings was arrested on a charge of statutory rape. He was convicted as an adult and first sentenced to Lowndes County Jail. Lauderdale County Sheriff William Sollie, who oversees the jail, said that as a primary short-term holding facility, it does not provide education to inmates. For the few who are sentenced to long-term stays, GED classes are offered. Jennings did not take them.
After several months at Lowndes, he was sent to the Walnut Grove Youth Correctional Facility. At the time, the prison, a privately-run facility an hour northeast of Jackson, was the only place for youths age 13 to 22 who had been tried as adults. Although the facility did have a school, a 2010 lawsuit by the Southern Poverty Law Center alleged that, among other things, fewer than half of the 1,200 inmates there attended classes.
Jennings, who is out of prison on appeal, unemployed and living with his grandmother, said he took GED classes at Walnut Grove, but did not get the extra help he needed. Before going to prison, he read at a kindergartener's level, according to his IEP. His math skills were that of a first grader.
"If he hadn't gone to prison, I think he'd be reading by now," Glenn said. "He would have learned more. [Now] he'll always be dependent."
As a result of the lawsuit, a new private company took control of the jail and Walnut Grove was converted into an adult facility. Current Walnut Grove warden Lepher Jenkins said he could not speak to the specifics of Jennings' case because he was not in charge at the time. But he said that Walnut Grove has always placed an emphasis on education and that any learning disabilities should be identified as soon as youth are admitted, and addressed in class.
Now that Walnut Grove serves adults, minors who are convicted as adults will go to the Youthful Offenders Unit at the Central Mississippi Correction Facility. The unit's school, which was accredited in May, teaches all core subjects and offers vocational programs in lawn care, barbering and custodial services. The Department of Corrections denied a request to visit the school.
The Walnut Grove lawsuit was one of many brought against Mississippi facilities. Legal action by the Southern Poverty Law Center and other groups about general conditions and abuse have also forced the closure of two detention centers and one youth development center.
The one remaining juvenile correction facility in the state only recently got out of legal trouble. In 2003, the Oakley Youth Development Center was sued by the U.S. Department of Justice for violating youth's civil rights with "staff violence and abusive institutional practices, unreasonable use of isolation and restraints, and inadequate medical, mental health and educational services." In 2005, Oakley entered into an agreement to reform. The facility's school was accredited in 2012 and this fall, the lawsuit was dismissed. [MORE]