Schwartz-Chaney is also a former STEM research coordinator for the Black Male Initiative at New York City College of Technology. She teaches writing at New York State’s Queensboro Correctional Facility, a minimum-security prison in New York City.

A critical researcher, critical race theorist, and social activist scholar, she co-edited Race, Education, and Reintegrating Formerly Incarcerated Citizens: Counterstories & Counterspaces, published by Rowman & Littlefield in 2015. She is the co-author of Gifts from the Dark: Learning from the Incarceration Experience, published in 2021, and also co-authored Learning to Disclose: A Journey of Transracial Adoption published by Peter Lang in 2020. 

In Spring 2024, Joni Schwartz-Chaney and her husband, John R. Chaney, will begin work on a new program funded by the U.S. Department of Justice called the “Second Chance Act Improving Reentry Education and Employment Outcomes.” The $900,000 grant over three years (beginning in Oct. 2023) will fund the development of college credit bearing classes in prison for mainly men of color returning home.  

Joni Schwartz-Chaney lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her husband, John R. Chaney, a City University of New York associate professor, whose background includes practicing law and criminal justice administration.