I recently attended the annual National Conference on Higher Education in Prison (NCHEP) in Pittsburgh where education and activism was a true reality. After the conference, I wrote an article for Truthout, a powerful online news magazine, entitled Higher Education Is a Key to Decarceration: Let’s Pass the REAL Act. The article aimed to clarify that we need to support the Second Chance Pell Pilot Program recently promoted by President Obama but also: We need to both help students continue their education when they leave prison and to pass the Restoring Education and Learning (REAL) Act, returning education to all. You can read more about that here.
Image courtesy of NCHEP2015
Many of the important players in developing and fighting for higher education for incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people were at this conference. They are working to give people behind bars true opportunity. On Thursday, November 6, as a prologue to the weekend, activists from the Pittsburgh community gathered to share their work. Jacqueline Roebuck Sakho emphasized how important it is to bring all parts of a community together when we are trying to solve a problem as systemic as mass incarceration. The Amachi Ambassadors, young people who have family in prison, a vibrant group I saw the first time this past summer at the Free Her Conference, put on a debate about banning the box. The box is that nasty little box that colleges and employers often use to screen out applicants who have a criminal record. And across the country college students as well as prison activists are fighting to remove it.
Image courtesy of YouTube
While the ambassadors were able to argue both sides, they clearly knew how that box impacts lives. To underscore that point, on a panel where a town hall discussion occurred, Anna Hollis with Amachi Pittsburgh said that 150 laws have been passed in Pennsylvania in the past few years, many criminalizing young people.
On Friday, November 7, some of the most interesting comments about how education changes lives came from the Indiana Women’s Prison Graduate Studies Program where three women were video-conferenced in from prison to discuss their post-graduate work. This is an amazing program organized by Professor Kelsey Kaufman which supports women’s academics at the prison. Students are working towards a PhD without the benefit of any Internet for their research, One woman said “Universities need to demystify their exclusivity.” Another said, “Education has been freedom.” These women are anything but deterred by obstacles.
On Saturday, November 8, formerly incarcerated activists talked about their work on returning Pell Grants to all (see here), and male prisoners video-conferenced in from FCI McKean in Pennsylvania described a therapeutic community and their work as educators. The idea pioneered by prisoners is to train people behind bars to become assistant teachers to students. One man emphasized that we need more men of color teaching incarcerated men. Another commented that education should be measured in terms of “how many men and women have been awakened.” Indeed, he added: “Higher education should inspire wardens to see themselves as heads of educational institutions.” This program is shepherded by a powerhouse educator at the University of Pittsburgh, Tony Gaskew.
I was fortunate enough to present with Karter Reed who I will write much more about in the coming months. When we first met, it was by mail in November 2007, and the encounter was a fluke. Being an avid reader, Reed found a book I had written in the Shirley Massachusetts prison library: Shakespeare Behind Bars: The Power of Drama in a Women’s Prison. He wanted to know if I could help his friend, a female prisoner who wanted information about parole. One hundred letters and six years later, we had learned about each other’s lives and influenced each other in powerful ways. Through his video clip (he is out of prison but could not attend the conference) and my presentation, we talked about how letters are a particular kind of educational tool. They give hope, provide connection, and allow a way to share ideas, feelings, and dreams for those behind bars. Through our letters, I learned about issues and more about the truth of incarceration, and I became an activist.
Photo by Eileen MacDougall
It is always impressive to see how education inspires activism and this conference underscored that point. The idea of turning prisons into schools has been around for awhile, but to see how much education can mean is impressive: access, hope, knowledge, understanding, a political grasp, skills, and a sense of history.