OK, thank you all for hanging in there with me through these last couple blogs on my teaching experience in prison. I’ve already covered the benefits and potential issues of teaching ACE (adult continuing education) classes from the instructor and student perspectives, so for this final blog in the series, I’m going to put down a few of my thoughts on the importance of teaching in prison for the prison community as a whole.
This is definitely the most intangible of the three (instructor, student, community), but may also have the most profound impact for both the actual students as well as the general community. The benefits for the students I’ve already touched on in Parts I and II, but how can an ACE program impact those who don’t even sign up for classes?
A couple reasons:
1) ACE classes are by-and-large run and taught by inmate volunteers. We donate our time to a program that is created to benefit inmates and provide learning and academic opportunities where there may not be opportunities otherwise. The program is also designed to leverage the experience and knowledge of inmates at that institution so that others at that institution can learn from that experience and spread that knowledge to whoever wants to learn. As the program grows, and inmates hear about the opportunities offered, it gives everyone something to be proud of that is produced by inmates for the inmate community. This feeling can go a long way in a prison environment.
2) ACE classes are open to any and all (as long as class sizes permit), so the interactions in class can cross all sorts of prison-societal lines that typically are not crossed. Yard politics can be set aside in the classroom setting for honest intellectual discussion, and conversations occur that bring understanding between inmates who would not normally have interacted. This allows for a greater sense of overall community in a place where community can often be defined as your assigned block or building. It’s one of the few random joys I get when one of my students (who I would otherwise never see) greets me or asks me a question about a topic from class as he sees me on the compound.
So yes, these benefits are harder to quantify, but given the strict environment we live under, and the social constraints that often limit our daily interactions, these points can be even more impactful than the individual benefits outlined in my last couple blogs.
So, we are currently set to start the next term in the next few weeks are so, and I’m deep in curriculum and materials prep for my next class. This is taking up some of my time, and I can definitely feel some of the mental gears loosening up and I’m doing the necessary mental organization to create my lecture notes and prepare for anticipated Q&A.
I also recently did a one-off psychology talk for a career prep series that was set up for those inmates who are close to release (more on that topic in an upcoming blog), so I had a great opportunity to interact with some motivated and interested participants.
All of these things check off the boxes for why I eagerly continue to teach in our ACE program (as well as any other opportunities to help our Education department), but as noted above, my strongest sense for why this is all worth doing comes from the sense of achievement for the community that pervades the program (instructors, students, etc) as a whole. Hopefully, if any of you have the opportunity to get some experience teaching in prison, you’ll also feel this accomplishment as well.
OK, thanks again for sticking with me through my journey, and I’ll be back in a bit to talk about my experience diving into the psychology of the job search for inmates reentering society. Thanks for reading!
