USA: how "schools not prisons" became a favorite rallying cry for criminal justice reformers

A bill winding its way through the Legislature proposes a creative way to fund early childhood education: imposing a tax on companies that do business with California’s prison systems.

A tax on the “privilege” of such contracts, as Assemblyman Tony Thurmond (D-Richmond) puts it, is an unorthodox policy prescription. But by directly tying the state’s incarceration system to its education programs, Thurmond is treading familiar political territory.

The slogans vary: “Books not bars, “schools not prisons,” even “educate not incarcerate.” The messengers range from former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to the rapper Jay Z. Increasingly, the rallying cry for prison overhaul is linked to education.

“There’s a natural nexus,” Thurmond said. “The fact that we pay so much for prisons — if we had spent just a portion of that on education, we would’ve prevented so many people from being incarcerated.”

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