ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the transformative abilities of education and how I used them as part of my desistance trajectory. This was the theme of my PhD which I completed in 2018 where I interviewed 24 ex-prisoners who had all made significant self-transformations through higher education. The important message is that it was not education alone that enable their transformations but also additional factors such as social bonds which Sampson and Laub talk about in their longitudinal study of former offenders. This chapter will focus on my own trajectory through education which was very much the same as most of the individuals I interviewed. In 2001, I graduated from Teesside University with a bachelor’s degree in criminology then the following year, I started my master’s degree which I completed in 2003. Many things have led me onto my path of learning, and when I talk about turning points in relation to desistance, there are several of these in relation to my education pathway alone.
