Ryan Rising was first imprisoned when he was 12 years old and was known for being a troublemaker. The label followed him in and out of prison for the next two decades. During that time, he replaced his drug addiction with one of acquiring knowledge. Rising is now pursuing a doctorate in criminology at the University of California, Irvine, studying strategies that prevent recidivism or repeated criminal behavior. He is also helping to create a pipeline between prison and university to help other formerly incarcerated people earn degrees.

How and when did you start your university journey?

In 2009, I was sentenced to seven years in California State Prison, Sacramento, in Folsom, where I was given a high school graduation certificate but without receiving a proper education. I didn’t start taking college courses until 2013, after people incarcerated in several California prisons participated in a hunger strike to protest their living conditions. I was one of approximately 30,000 people in more than 30 prisons who participated and refused to eat for 33 days. My fellow inmates and I came to the conclusion that we were willing to take the risk so that the next generation of families would not have to experience a continuous cycle of criminalization, in which incarcerated individuals continue to be treated and labeled as criminals while in prison and after their release. The United States has built a justice system that often focuses more on punishment than rehabilitation. We were stored in prison with no support services. However, after that hunger strike, we were allowed to take courses by mail through Lassen Community College in nearby Susanville, California.

How was that experience?

I took two college courses per semester. One of my first classes was on the pharmacology of drugs that can be abused, including prescription medications and illegal drugs. I wrote articles on 12 substances, combining my research on their health impacts with the effects I had personally experienced. I never did drugs again after writing that article.

But I didn’t know how to write with proper punctuation. For example, I used forward slashes as sentence breaks. The instructor told me to read books to learn how to write correctly. I earned two A+ grades that first semester. I became addicted to achieving A+ results and fell in love with knowledge. I left prison with dozens of course credits, but without a completed degree.

How did you continue your higher education after leaving prison?

I left prison in 2015 with $200 in my pocket and traveled by bus to San Diego, California, arriving at two in the morning. There were people sleeping in tents or on drugs everywhere. I thought, “What the hell is going on here?” They offered me drugs and at that moment I had a choice. I kept walking. I ended up falling asleep on a bench. I woke up outside San Diego City College and decided I wanted to go there. It changed the entire trajectory of my life. Once enrolled, I met other students who had been incarcerated and we created a student-run initiative called Urban Scholars Union. We lobbied for institutional recognition, support, and resources for formerly incarcerated students at the university. That initiative gave rise to the Rising Scholars Network, and is currently implemented in more than 90 community colleges in California. After completing my two-year associate’s degree with honors, I received a three-year scholarship that allowed me to pursue a bachelor’s degree in sociology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, an institution with a long history of activism. The US county of Santa Barbara has one of the highest recidivism rates in California.

At the University of California, Santa Barbara, I created the Gaucho Underground Scholars program and secured $4 million in funding to expand it. The program is similar to the Rising Scholars Network, but is implemented throughout the University of California system. For my efforts to support formerly incarcerated people, I received the Michael D. Young Engaged Scholar Award, which recognizes students who have used their academic knowledge to take action and create positive change.

What drives your community service work?

I have been criminalized my entire life, so I decided to become a criminologist. My work has been to erase the stigma associated with people who have been incarcerated. We are not monsters; We are credible messengers and can be agents of change in our communities. A credible messenger is someone with lived experience (often including facing injustice or incarceration) who has transformed that experience into trusted leadership, using it to mentor others and create pathways away from violence and toward education, employment, healing, and community leadership. In our circumstances, access to weapons and drugs is easy. The difficult thing is going to university.

What does your PhD research focus on?

I am trying to identify ideal and successful models of initiatives to prevent recidivism and help formerly incarcerated people reenter society. Strategies may include providing housing, mentoring, and professional development opportunities. I am using a qualitative mixed methods study, which includes interviews and surveys with formerly incarcerated individuals who have participated in a variety of support programs while attending college. I will document their career paths, barriers they have experienced, financial aid they have received, and how much student debt they have incurred to identify what works and what doesn’t so funds can be directed appropriately. My advocacy work also goes beyond simply increasing access to education; it is about changing who produces knowledge about incarceration and justice.

How do you combine your research with community work?

For me, academic research and community work are not separate. They are in constant conversation with each other. My community work makes my research responsible. I don’t want to simply describe the world, but change it. At the University of California, Irvine, where I am pursuing my PhD, I founded the West Coast Credible Messengers program, which frames reentry into society as a community health issue. My colleagues and I work in juvenile detention centers in Orange County, California, mentoring incarcerated teens on how to serve their communities. We use art and creative writing to teach emotional intelligence, critical thinking, and how teens can grow from their experiences. Our efforts aim to address the well-documented school-to-prison pipeline, in which youth from low-income neighborhoods and underrepresented groups are disproportionately likely to be incarcerated, and redirect individuals toward a prison-to-college pipeline.