Prison gardening programs in California and abroad have provided incarcerated people opportunities for an environmental education, giving them a second chance at life.

The website EarthDay.org stated that gardening programs have been known to empower incarcerated people, showing them how to address food insecurities in their communities. The objective is to bring nature-based science and environmental education into correctional facilities. 

Land Together, formerly known as the Insight Garden Prison Project,  at San Quentin gives residents master gardener training in conjunction with non-profit organization Planting Justice. PJ is a program that teaches incarcerated people to grow their own food, educates them about economic justice, and provides community healing, noted PJ. 

“I like the soil per se. When you put your hands inside the soil, it’s like putting your hands inside the Earth, becoming one with nature,” said SQ resident William James Harris, 53, who paroled on April 29, 2026. 

Harris was incarcerated 29 years. He said he started gardening at California State Prison-Folsom.  

Harris said he became attracted to the scent of sage, because it smelled peaceful to him and put him in a place of relaxation. He added the Native Americans used sage to take away spirits and help cleanse the soul. 

The sage plant affects the psychic senses, which make a person aware of details that were unknown to them. The plant enables meditation and permits access to the subconscious mind, according to the Native American Herbalist Bible by Leotie Hicks. 

The alignment of ecological responsibility with prisoners’ education can transform correctional facilities into places of positive change, noted EarthDay. 

Isa Pena, the Land Together project director at SQ, created a garden on the prison’s main exercise yard. LT originally started in H-Unit, a lower security part of SQ, where Harris continued his gardening when transferred from Folsom.. 

The LT garden was placed in a high traffic area, where residents exercised only a few feet away. In the middle of the garden is a cement path that leads to a drinking fountain. One SQ resident took his canteen-purchased water container, filled it up, and watered the plants several times. 

The garden area is not protected with typical prison razor wire, but SQ residents use multiple pathways to navigate through the garden with respect.  

At a 2025 Day of Peace event on SQ’s Lower Yard, residents painted rocks that surround the edge of the garden. The rocks were painted with rainbow colors, as well  writings of positive affirmations such as: “You belong,” “You matter,” “Freedom,” and “Thank you, Isa [Pena].”

Investment in gardening programs gives people second chances, offering psychological benefits by exposing incarcerated people to employment opportunities through green job training. The gardening programs transform people by breaking the barriers of poverty and unemployment, according to EarthDay.

The website stated that education can increase a person’s future earnings by 10%, which will allow them to secure stable housing and adequate nutrition. It will also save taxpayers money when it comes to the expense of incarcerated people’s healthcare. 

Other correctional facilities have used different methods in their environmental programs such as beekeeping, turtle rehabilitation, and prairie conservation. Educational gardening programs have given 1,326 college credits in gardening basics to 237 incarcerated students, stated EarthDay.

At Snake River Correctional Institute in Oregon, the prison collaborated with the Nature Imagery in Prisons Project. They found that people held in solitary confinement who viewed films about nature were 26% less likely to commit a violent act, noted the website.

Evergreen State College and the Washington State Department of Corrections partnered to empower sustainable change by bringing environmental education into its prison. Environmental programs also exist in local jails, federal prisons, and youth correctional facilities, stated EarthDay. 

The website noted that in 2016 the research organization RAND discovered that people in prison who engage in any type of educational program are 43% less likely to reoffend.

Environmental education in prison is not limited to the United States. The U.K. has the Greener Prisons Initiative at His Majesty’s Prison Bristol. That garden program aims to enhance ecological literacy, reduce food waste, and reconnect the incarcerated with the natural world. 

Harris stated that a person who participates in a gardening program has been afforded an opportunity to learn what nature does for people, how a person who cultivates the earth can heal spiritually. The healing will begin when a person witnesses the result of their planting something and then watches it grow.

“You will never know what gardening can do for you until you try it,” Harris said. “If you’re the one looking for a little bit of solitude and peace of mind, then try the Insight Gardening Project.”