Second Chance Act Technology Career Training Grant Program

From Prison to Prosperity, a program offered by the St. Louis Agency on Training and Employment (SLATE), seeks to curb recidivism and improve reentry outcomes among young adults by prioritizing employment and financial literacy programming. Pictured above are recent program participants.

This program provides funding for state and local government agencies, territories, and federally recognized Native American tribes to support training for technology-related jobs and reentry planning and services. The U.S. Department of Justice’s Bureau of Justice Assistance (BJA) administers the awards.

Objectives and Deliverables

With the goal of increasing participants’ post-release employability in technology-driven occupations, grantees must establish career training programs for incarcerated adults and/or juveniles during the 6- to 36-month period before their release from a prison, jail, or juvenile facility.

Career training programs funded through this grant must include the following:

• A formal partnership with a training entity (e.g., community college, job center, employer-sponsored training program) to provide job training in at least one correctional facility;
• A moderate- to high-risk target population as identified using a validated assessment tool;
• Job training in technology-driven occupational fields (e.g., auto mechanics, manufacturing, information technology, health) for which there is labor demand in the communities to which participants will be returning;
• Individualized reentry plans and case management that link participants to community-based services and employment support after release; and
• The ability to collect and report data on post-program employment and recidivism outcomes for participants.

For more information, see the most recent BJA grant solicitation and a related webinar.

Current and Past Grantees

BJA has awarded 44 grants for career training programs: 8 in 2010; 6 in 2011; 5 in 2012; 9 in 2013; 6 in 2014; 4 in 2015; and 6 in 2016.