Earlier this week, President Obama announced in a Washington Post op-ed that he is adopting at the federal level the recommendations made by the U.S. Department of Justice’s review of the use of solitary confinement, including that the practice should not be used for juveniles, people with serious mental health issues, and as a punishment for low-level offenses. The report also recommends that Vera’s Safe Alternatives to Segregation Initiative, which currently works in five states to reduce the use of segregation (solitary confinement) and implement safe alternatives, expand to partner with additional jurisdictions. Learn more about the current use of solitary confinement, its impacts, and what can be done to address it at our online resource center, www.safealternativestosegregation.org, which includes our recent report on common misconceptions about solitary confinement. 
Last month, Vera released Incarceration Trends, a new interactive tool aimed at informing the public debate on mass incarceration by providing easily accessible information on jail populations in every U.S. county, including growth from 1970-2014, as well as racial and gender disparities in incarceration rates. An accompanying fact sheet and report, In Our Own Backyard: Confronting Growth and Disparities in American Jails, summarize the key findings of the data, including that incarceration rates have grown most outside of the largest counties. For more, watch project lead Chris Henrichson describe how to use the tool and highlights it reveals, and check out coverage in the Associated Press, the Washington Post’s Wonkblog, Vox, and VICE.
 What we did in 2015: Read a recap of our work in 2015, with a focus on our core priorities —reducing mass incarceration by stopping the overuse of local jails; improving the conditions in prisons and jails for the people in them; and raising trust in the justice system, particularly between law enforcement and the communities it serves—as well as our recognition of the 20th anniversary of the 1994 Crime Bill and 25th anniversary of the Americans with Disabilities Act, and our tour of German prisons.
 This month, Governor Andrew Cuomo proposed a higher education initiative in New York State prisons that will provide education resources for about 1,000 incarcerated people over the next five years. Vera’s Fred Patrick spoke with the Christian Science Monitor about the initiative and why opinions on higher education in prison are shifting. Watch our video on why we should invest in postsecondary education in prison, with interviews of a participant in Vera’s Pathways from Prison to Postsecondary Education project, corrections officials, and college administrators. Our fact sheet for colleges seeking to partner with corrections agencies offers advice on maintaining successful partnerships. President Obama highlighted criminal justice reform as a priority in his State of the Union address earlier this month. Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy, a leading figure in reform policy, sat with First Lady Michelle Obama during the address. Read about Malloy’s criminal justice leadership, and Vera’s tour of German prisons, highlighted in the Connecticut Mirror.
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