Programs - Prison Architect Wiki (2024)

This article is about the different skills and lessons your prisoners and staff can learn from within your prison. For information about researching Education, see Bureaucracy.

Summary[edit | edit source]

Daily programs can be run to train, educate and reform your prisoners. These programs are administered from the Programs tab in the Reports interface. Each program runs during a scheduled time during the day, based on the allocated Work time in the Regime, and costs money per session. Different programs provide different benefits to both the player and the participating prisoners.

Prisoners can only take part in one program at a time, and may only attend one session in that program per day. Most programs are voluntary, but prisoners will be less likely to volunteer for programs if they are badly treated. Prisoners must complete the Workshop Safety Induction or Kitchen Safety and Hygiene courses before they can work in the Workshop or Kitchen respectively.

Scheduling[edit | edit source]

Programs are automatically scheduled to Work slots, not freetime slots, in the Regime. For example, if work is scheduled in for 9am, 11am-1pm, and 2pm-5pm, sessions that are 2 hours long will be scheduled to 11am-12pm and 2pm-4pm. Whereas 3 hour long sessions will be scheduled to 2pm-5pm only.

If Micromanagement is researched from the Bureaucracy tree, the times and locations of all programs can be adjusted manually with the "Edit Schedule" button. Programs set manually will be pinned in place, and will not be moved by the auto-scheduler.New programs can be created by clicking in the Scheduler view. Right-click on programs to cancel them.

Parole Hearings, Death Row Appeals and the Guard Tazer Certification do not require to be performed within the work regime and instead may be performed anytime.

Prisoner Programs[edit | edit source]

Theory involves the prisoners sitting down and learning directly from the instructor. Practical involves the prisoners using tools to directly learn from the instructor.

Staff Programs[edit | edit source]

Theory involves the staff sitting down and learning directly from the instructor.

Being equipped with tazers makes guards more powerful, and it also helps them reduce their safety need. Disarming certification helps guards stop violent prisoners without the use of deadly force.

Tips[edit | edit source]

• Suppressed prisoners are less likely to volunteer for a program, and gang members will not participate in any voluntary program at all (so do Death Row prisoners, as they don't follow any Regime at all).
• Some prisoners have more affinity for academic topics than others. In addition, the level of concentration of your prisoners is a major factor on their chances of success. (Prisoners concentrate best when all of their needs have been taken care of.)
• Programs cost per session, so running programs with only a few prisoners is relatively expensive. You may want to wait until enough prisoners are interested/referred, and you should plan your rooms big enough to provide enough space for the equipment needed for the maximum number of participants.
• However, parole hearings are free, so it's a good idea to schedule as many as possible so that there are as little left in queue as possible.
• The Guard Tazer Certification can be scheduled in the middle of the night, where the guards would idle otherwise.
• The "Reschedule All" button will reset the prisoners in each program without the program losing progress. This is useful for when prisoners are sitting in queue instead of joining classes.

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