Disrupting the School-To-Prison Pipeline: An Action Guide for Libraries

The school-to-prison pipeline impacts communities across the country; often, this system and families impacted by it remain invisible. But librarians, educators, and others who work with youth know first-hand that libraries and reading can be life-altering for youth impacted by incarceration. Written by public librarians who have supported youth before, during, and after incarceration, this book draws from their own experiences while showcasing insights from other library workers, researchers, educators, people who work in the juvenile justice fields, and mental health professionals. Designed to empower libraries and their staff to provide children and teens with information, visibility, knowledge and skills, recreation, and role models, it shares practical strategies for helping youth avoid the school-to-prison pipeline or contend with it. Readers will discover

• a concise explanation of the school-to-prison pipeline, including statistics on how and why it disproportionately impacts LGBTQ+, BIPOC, and disabled youth;
• concrete, proven strategies for disrupting youth incarceration pathways by giving young people the tools and support they need to avoid incarceration;
• steps for bolstering youth engagement during out of school time;
• guidance on how to align disciplinary approaches with trauma-informed practices when dealing with rowdy youth and other disruptive behavior;
• an overview of what libraries are doing to provide programs and services inside a youth facility, including literacy support, high school equivalency/GED programs, and televisiting;
• strategies for combatting the isolation of children of incarcerated parents by creating inclusive and welcoming library environments;
• information about the complex and difficult process of reentry for incarcerated youth, with adaptable ideas and lessons from the work being done in libraries for reentering adults; and
• an inspiring vision, extrapolating from work in adjacent fields, of what libraries can do to overcome barriers to bringing more youth into the library.

Carrie Scott Bankshas been in charge of Brooklyn Public Library's Inclusive Services since 1997 and taught Including Youth with Disabilities at Pratt Institute from 2013 to 2015. In 2012 she was named a Library Journal Mover & Shaker. Active in ALA, ASGCLA, and ALSC since 2000, she was the 2020 President of ASGCLA and has served most recently on the Ad Hoc Committee to Revise Correctional Library Standards in 2024. In 2014, she substantially revised Including Families of Children with Special Needs: A How to Do It Manual for Librarians. Libraries and Garden: Growing Together (written with Cynthia Mediavilla) was published in 2019 and Disrupting the School-to-Prison Pipeline: An Action Guide for Libraries (written with Jill Anderson) was published in 2026.

Jill Anderson is the Assistant Director of Jail, Prison, Reentry, and Youth Justice at Queens Public Library. She is interested in outreach, the public library as a community space, and conversations surrounding non-monogamy and queerness.