The external efficiency of prison education in Kiambu County, Kenya
Loading...
Date
2014-07-24
Authors
Mwangi, James Kiama
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Abstract
The transition that prisoners make from the custody and the control of the correctional
institutions into the outside world has become a pressing concern internationally.
Prisoners' reentry into the society has emerged as a lens through which to view the
numerous issues related to the process of a prisoner's incarceration, release and
subsequent failure or success on the outside world. Prison education is widely recognized
as playing a central role in the successful reintegration of prisoners into wider
community. This kind of education must be externally efficient by meeting both
individual and societal needs. There is, therefore, need to look into the external efficiency
of prison education, with the aim of improving the quality of education for inmates in
terms of physical facilities, manpower requirements and funding. The objectives of the
study are: to establish if prisons' rehabilitative education is externally efficient, to assess
the status of educational and vocational facilities in prisons and to identify the challenges
facing prisons' rehabilitative education in Kiambu County. The study is based on human
capital theory. This theory is relevant since prison education should be externally
efficient by making prisoners upon release participate in economic development and
societal wellbeing. The target population of this study will comprise of 2 prison wardens,
23 prison instructors and the 1,364 prisoners. The study will employ descriptive survey
design. The selected sample for this study will comprise of 2(100%) officers in
charge,5(20%) prison teachers and 136(10%) inmates both first time offenders and
recidivist inmates from 2 prisons in Kiambu County. Purposive sampling will be used to
select the only prison with both male and female prisoners and also to select the officers
in charge to be interviewed. From the remaining two male prisons, one prison will used
for pilot study meaning the remaining one male prison will automatically be included for
study, The prisoners will be selected purposively to include first time offenders and
recidivist inmate. Participants will be selected through simple random sampling.
Observation guide, questionnaires and interview schedules will be the major tools for
data collection. Questionnaires will be administered to prison instructors (teachers) and
inmates, while interviews will be administered to officer in charge. The data will be
analyzed descriptively using frequencies, percentages, means and standard deviation
using statistical package for social sciences (SPSS). Qualitative data obtained will be
grouped according to study objectives and then coded. The result will be presented in
form of tables and figure. It is hoped that this research will shed more light on the
external efficiency of prison education in Kiambu County.