Ms Claire O'Connell:

It is a challenge. It is a challenge because of a multitude of other factors that exist outside of education. Addiction is a major challenge, as is homelessness. I work as a guidance counsellor. I have often asked where person was going to be based when they were due to be released. Initially, the motivating factor for that was to establish where a person might be living to facilitate him or her to do a course. Now, when I am asking it is primarily to ascertain whether he or she has accommodation. Frequently, the answer is “No”. There are challenges, as I said, in pursuing education upon release. They mainly arise outside the actual education sphere. We have pre-release programmes. We carry out individual pre-release planning with students. This might start 12 months or more before they are released. Frequently, people have an ambition to take on a level 4, level 5 or level 6 course. They need to be working away at the earlier levels with us in the prison. We always have an education plan for all our students. Part of that would involve post-release planning and linking them in. It is not just a matter of making applications, but also of linking them in with other colleges they might wish to attend.

We do a great deal of work with the Pathways Centre. Even if everything is in place, the process of being released back into the community is a very challenging and difficult one to manage for our students. This is especially the case if they have been in prison for a long time. There needs to be a transition programme for them. The Pathways Centre is fantastic at providing that. We also link them in with many other agencies, such as Jobcare and Care After Prison, which provide practical supports that are needed before education can even be considered. For example, trying to open a bank account is a major challenge if you do not have photo identification. If you have been in prison for a number of years, you do not have a driver’s licence and you do not have a passport. Some students with whom I have worked with have never had either. We link them in with services such as Care After Prison, which physically go into the banks with them and help them to work out the very practical issues which need to be in place before somebody can really engage in continuing with their education.