BY JAMES FERRY

Academe editor Michael Ferguson reached out to me. He recalled that one of my gigs was teaching at a local prison, and he wanted to know if I’d be interested in writing an article about my experiences. I leaped at the chance since graduate students don’t often get pitched on publishing opportunities. Plus, prison education is a cause close to my heart. I did a short stint myself back in the day, and I clawed my way out of that nightmare and into a PhD program. Now I teach, and occasionally I publish. For someone who believed, not too long ago, that he’d flushed his life down the toilet, things have been going surprisingly well. I can hardly complain.

So when my supervisor for the prison education program broke the news that funding was scant, that there wasn’t a teaching slot for me this semester, I was more than a bit bummed out. If you read my recently published Academe article, “Why I Go to Prison” you’ll understand why. I could be a social media influencer, making bank with my brand messaging, yet I eke out a living on a TA stipend and the occasional side gig. So it wasn’t about the money, but c’mon: the state of Rhode Island can’t cough up enough dough to satisfy the demand for prison education? Something’s not right in the world!

But then, things haven’t been right for a while. Two decades ago Democrats like Tim Holden of Pennsylvania could be heard preaching on the House floor, “We are sending a terrible message to the American public when we are spending at least $35,000,000 sending convicted felons to institutions of higher learning!” Actually, Tim, the terrible message was the one you were sending. Pell Grants for prisoners were eliminated. Recidivism rates spiked, and mass incarceration exploded. Clinton’s crime bill may have seemed like a good idea at the time, but it didn’t age well.

But there was hope. Six years ago, Governor Cuomo of New York began promoting the Bard Prison Initiative, one of a few privately-funded “colleges” that have been making waves. Students who complete the program are recidivating at a rate of 4 percent—as opposed to the 50 percent typical of parolees released without any schooling. Meanwhile, for every dollar donated to the BPI, taxpayers are getting back five in return (through savings in court costs, housing, food, and other expenses) If your stockbroker pitched you on a trade like that—on someone else’s investment—I’m quite certain you’d leap.

So why is it so hard to get people on board with prison education? The answer: discrimination. Prisoners are marginalized to a degree that most of us could hardly fathom. I was locked up for just a few months, and that was long enough. Having  vowed never to wear those shackles again, I signed up to go in and teach at a prison as soon as I was qualified, braving that environment voluntarily. That balmy day back in ’08 when those cops busted me with a short stack of drugs, there wasn’t enough money to keep me out of jail. Twelve years and two graduate degrees later, there isn’t enough to keep me going back. How’s that for irony?

The first thing we need to do is get out and vote. Trump may have signed the First Step Act into law, but it’s just that—a first step. Meanwhile he’s tweet-bragging about having spent “Two Trillion Dollars on Military Equipment” (his caps). I don’t know about you, but I don’t feel any safer. And it’s hard to imagine an investment like that yielding anything close to a fivefold return.

So write to your congress member, shout at your senator. Support prison education. I understand that most of us would rather steer clear of jail, but maybe we can work at getting more educators in there—and hence more productive citizens back into society. At the end of the day, in one way or another, we’re all serving time on this planet together. Aren’t we?

Guest blogger James Ferry teaches writing and rhetoric courses at both the University of Rhode Island and the Community College of Rhode Island. Upon finishing his PhD, he hopes to make prison education the focal point of his academic career. 

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