The Bard Prison Initiative, part of Bard College located in Annandale-on-Hudson, N.Y, seeks to change the perception of prisoners convicted of violent crime, as well as put the "correction" in "correctional facility."
Part of this initiative has led to a prisoner debate team, which started in 2014. The team takes on some of the bigger powerhouse colleges and universities throughout the country, and isn't just competing--they're succeeding. Their latest success? Defeating Harvard.
“They caught us off guard,” Anais Carell, a 20-year-old junior from Chicago, told The Wall Street Journal.
As Alex Hall, a 31-year-old from Manhattan convicted of manslaughter countered, “We might not be as naturally rhetorically gifted, but we work really hard.”
The $2.5 million budget for the program isn't supplied by the state (which cowers at using tax dollars to educate prisoners), but instead by private donations.
Studies show the Bard Prison Initiative program actually works long-term. 40% of general population prisoners end up arrested within three years of their release. Those prisons with strong educational programs have recidivism rates that drop to 22%. By comparison, the recidivism rate for alumni of the Bard Prison Initiative program during that same time period is only 2%.
Putting the "correction" back into "correctional facility." What a concept.
Full disclosure: I have worked on educational programs through a prison. Some of the smartest, most gifted individuals I've ever known were men who committed a violent crime--often, usually, a crime of passion. A crime I could commit. A crime you could commit. A crime any of us would commit if placed in the same situation, position, or bearing in life.
And these same men I'd trust with my life, despite the fact that some might have already taken the life of another. Because they accomplished the one thing most any of you reading this cannot do--that I cannot do--and that is correct what needs correcting in ourselves.
No comments:
Post a Comment