Woodbourne, N.Y. — It’s a Friday afternoon in December, and history professor John Fout is leading the students in his course, “Nazi Germany and the Holocaust,” in a spirited discussion.
Every time he has taught this class, Fout says from behind his desk in Room 7, students always ask: “If the Germans were losing the war, why didn’t they use the Jews to help them? If you can answer that question, you can answer the question of Nazi Germany.” He pauses and looks around. “And what’s the answer?”
Eleven students, who are seated in rows of desks with their copies of Christopher Browning’s “The Origins of the Final Solution” propped open, begin throwing out ideas all at once.
“I think it’s the same reason why the United States doesn’t use prisoners,” Antoine Sims replies from the back row. “Because a prisoner is considered an enemy of the state.”
Hands shoot up into the air. Samuel Chung turns from his desk in the front of the classroom to face Sims. “But we’re here because of a crime,” Chung says. “What did they do?”
Sims, Chung and their classmates are students of the Bard Prison Initiative, an unusual program that sends professors into New York State prisons to teach a full slate of Bard College classes. There are 70 students working toward associate’s or bachelor’s degrees here at the Woodbourne Correctional Facility, 100 miles north of New York City.
Woodbourne, a medium-security facility, is one of two “main campuses” of the program; the other is the maximum-security Eastern New York Correctional Facility, just a few miles down the road. Several other prisons serve as “satellite campuses” where students can begin working toward their degrees and then transfer here to graduate.
The students in Fout’s class, History 201, read all the same books that Fout assigns to his students on campus, including a memoir by an SS commandant and a biography of Hitler that clocks in at more than 1,000 pages. “They just respond remarkably well,” Fout said of his students. “I just find the quality of the minds and the work of these students is as good as you could get, for teaching. A lot of days where I’ve had a really good class, I’m thinking to myself: How in the hell did these guys end up there when they’re that smart and that able to understand such complex material?”
The Bard prison program prides itself on its highly competitive admissions process. Executive Director Max Kenner, the program’s founder, said that each year, between 80 and 120 inmates apply for the 15 slots per campus. They are admitted on the basis of an analytical essay that they write in response to a piece of literature and how well they do in an interview.
“My first semester, I was leery,” said Fout, 72, an emeritus professor and European history scholar who retired from full-time teaching seven years ago; this is his third semester with the program. “I thought: What’s going to be the quality of the work? Will it be up to the standards of regular Bard undergraduate students? And what surprised me, and delighted me, was that, in a way, they’re better.”
Whereas typical college students have a full slate of classes and activities, not to mention active social lives, the students in this program have a lot of time and energy to focus on their classes, and are highly motivated to learn. “I was always disappointed by students who you wanted to make that extra effort for the final, and who don’t,” Fout said. “These guys, they do it! They reach for the next level of achievement, or level of sophistication, or level of understanding of the material. They just respond so great to encouragement.”
Since Congress eliminated Pell Grants for prisoners in 1994, access to higher education in prison has been extremely limited. Some prisons offer community college degree programs to students who can pay out of pocket — often a big hurdle, because the jobs available to people in prison typically pay less than 25 cents an hour. Bard’s program is one of only a few that are privately funded; its entire $1.2 million operating budget is privately raised, and covers everything from tuition to books to computers. (In 2009, the Bard program provided seed money to Wesleyan University to start a similar program in Connecticut.) Studio arts and lab sciences are limited because of logistical hurdles, but otherwise, students choose from the same breadth of math, science, social science and humanities classes as do the students on Bard College’s bucolic campus in Hudson Valley, N.Y. When they are finished, the students in prison graduate with diplomas “identical to diplomas we give on campus,” Kenner said.
In today’s class, the men have been debating exactly when the Holocaust began; students mention various pieces of legislation and milestones in World War II, until the discussion turns to the Nazis’ disastrous invasion of the Soviet Union, which many see as the turning point in Germany’s fortunes.
“I can’t be inclined to think that they would use Jews to help them,” Ray Brito said, “because they want to exterminate them.”
“Exactly,” Fout said, clearly pleased. “But why?”
“They saw Jews as being the end of Germany,” Brito responded. “Himmler himself said that we have to destroy the Jews or they will destroy us.”
“Exactly,” Fout said again. “The war in the Soviet Union is a racial war.”
Moises Barrera raises his hand to add, almost as if to himself, “Why would the ‘master race’ use the lowly Jews?”
Barrera has closely cropped hair, wire-rimmed glasses and a thoughtful demeanor. Originally from Queens, he is serving 15 years to life; he is one of seven students in the room convicted of second-degree murder. Barrera applied to the program twice before winning admission in 2005; he completed his associate’s degree and is working toward his bachelor’s. “For me,” he said later, attending the program “was about not being a hypocrite.”
Barrera is very close with his nieces and nephews, and one nephew in particular had not been doing well in school. Whenever Barrera would push him to work harder, his nephew would respond that his uncle hadn’t done too well, either. And it was true: Before being sent to prison 17 years ago, at age 19, Barrera hadn’t finished high school. He had to complete his GED at Woodbourne before he could apply to the program. “I didn’t want him to follow in my footsteps,” Barrera said. “It was showing him with actions.”
Barrera’s thoughtful reflection on the subject is not unique. The men in this room, all wearing variations on the state-issued green khaki uniform (they call it “state greens”), have a remarkable ability to think critically about the choices they’ve made in their lives. In part, they credit their age and their maturity — many of them, like Barrera, came in as teenagers and are now in their 30s — and in part, they credit college.
“I no longer look at myself the same way I did before coming to Bard,” said John Leone, a beefy man from Brooklyn with dark hair and blue eyes. By far the most outspoken and enthusiastic member of the class, Leone reads additional books beyond the hundreds of pages that Fout assigns, and came to class today with relevant newspaper clippings and poems to share with Fout. “When you’re forced to look at literature — you’re forced to go in there and inspect things that you can’t see on the surface — it forces you to develop a mind that thinks critically,” he said.
Leone, 43, was sent to prison nine years ago on attempted burglary charges. “I used to think: I stole some stuff. Nobody’s home, it’s not a big deal,’” he said. “When I developed a critical mind, I couldn’t look at things like that no more. I realized, it has wide and far-reaching consequences. I might be taking somebody’s property, but I’m also taking — I invaded their space. They feel robbed, they feel vulnerable.” College, he said, “changes the way you view the world, and yourself in that.”
Contact Beth Schwartzapfel at schwartzapfel@forward.com
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Are you kidding me?! Who pays for their college degrees? Isn't it the ultimate mockery of the working people of this country? I had to pay full price tag for my children to earn ther degrees, yet US criminals get it for free and help these professors feel good about themselves - they think they are helping to rehabilitate the humanity, whereas all they do is helping this human 'excrement' to continue mocking the system and us with it. Yo know, I want to go to jail, too! I also like to read and learn. Not to mention to get my three meals a day plus carry no other responsibilities whatsoever. What a sweet deal! Either I am crazy or the rest of this country has lost its mind?
Allie, The college degrees are paid by private funds. That means that people who think it is important that persons serving prison time develop critical minds and understand how their crimes affect others (the two men quoted in the last paragraphs)give the money. Tax payers are not funding this program. Also, given the affect on their relatives the education these men receive makes a difference in the larger world, preventing others from taking the same path they did.
How would you suggest dealing with criminals other than what you refer to as "three meals and no other responsibilities"? Forced labor and a starvation diet?
Blissful the believer. You believe that the program makes a difference in the lives of these criminals and their families. I do not. I still maintain that the very existence of these 'rehabilitation' programs, whether funded by private sources or by taxpayers, is a mockery of all honest, hard-working people. And, by the way, their stay in the prison (three meals, etc.) is still funded by me. I do not believe in rehabilitation, but I do believe in REAL punishment. Forced labor is not a bad idea, by the way. They might think twice next time - and tell others - before committng a crime. The issue here is to match the crime with appropriate punishment.
Allie is stupid
I agree. I feel very stupid to get my own education, to still have to work for living, after 30 years in the workforce. For having paid taxes on time and in full. For carrying responsibilities and maing things happen for my family. For many things that have not let me become as generous and liberal than you, Shimon baum.
Allie,
The point I was trying to make is that brutal punishment does not prevent repeat crime. Retraining attitudes and education does. I also found it ironic that this article is referring to Holocaust studies and you are advocating Holocaust type punishments for these men.
JB,
I never advocated Holocaust-type punishment. I would never advocate extermination of any people on this planet. However, punishment should serve its purpose, and not to become a resort-type activity, a reprieve from the world of responsibiities. There is a limit to civility that we should apply to our criminals and they should know it. Forced labor is not the same as Holocaust, but it wouldn't hurt for them to serve the society that they wronged in the first place, and pay back the money the society invests in their prison stay. And I do not mind a basic, well-rounded education for them, but a college degree from Bard? I am not a professional but rehabilitation might apply to young individuals, and it also works only in some cases. In case of hard-core criminals who have crossed the line it is a waste. Again, this is my opinion, stupid or else.
Also, even the professor admits that 'Whereas typical college students have a full slate of classes and activities, not to mention active social lives, the students in this program have a lot of time and energy to focus on their classes'. On top of their many responsibilities most of the typical students hold JOBS, something that these prisoners do not have to worry about.
Allie,
I have not called you stupid, you are however, uninformed, ignorant of the facts, that is correctable with a little effort.
Do you know what methods are most apt to produce the least recidivism and why? Do you know why it is difficult or impossible to provide convicted criminals with meaningful jobs? If persons at Bard college or associated with Bard want to donate money to provide a Bard education to some prisoners do we have the right to say they cannot?
The Nazis did not start out with extermination, they started out with forced labor and limited food rations. Perhaps because they only attacked the innocent: Jews, Gypsies, the retarded and homosexuals, you feel that this is not the same thing? I don't see it that way.
Teaching people with attempted murder convictions about holocaust. Not a good idea, will just desensitize them and make them more bloodthirsty.
I'm weighing in on the exchange between Allie and JB. They introduce what are pretty much the key points of contention about this very heated subject. Their exchange is also characteristic of tendency in similar debates on this subject where the respondents are speaking past each other. Let's make this simple:
Allie doesn't think inmates "deserve" a fancy education. He's not interested in what does or doesn't "work," whatever that may mean. Allie suggests he happens to not have much faith in rehabilitation at all, especially for adults, but Allies be honest, even if it could be proven that higher education prevented offenders from committing more crimes (which by the way, JB, it isn't, i'll return to this below), you still wouldn't support it. Your position is that having committed a terrible wrong (imagining for the moment that all inmates are, in fact, guilty), a person simply should not be "awarded" with an elite education. This position sees elite education as a gift, or a privilege, certainly not a right, and certainly not something that should be made available to people who have hurt others. We could dig a little deeper without stepping on shaky ground, I'd say, and realize that this is the position of someone who feels slighted or, someone who is protecting his own privilege. In the former, the slighted person would resist anything perceived as a "gift" to others, since he certainly didn't get it. And in the latter, the privileged person, always seeking to protect his privilege, resists any attempt to level the field, so to speak. In other words, this position is the expression of a feeling of extreme competition between individuals, rather than that of collective responsibility. At this point, it should be clear that for people with the "Allie" view, arguments about effectiveness miss the point entirely. Allie's is what his adversaries lambast as a "punitive" view of corrections. People like Allie get attacked for being revenge seekers, eye for an eye types ("the whole world goes blind" yada yada), with all the moral baggage this includes. While my own position in this debate pits me against the Allies, I argue as vociferously against my neighbors who have nothing but hate for the Allies. In their own resistance to moral challenges, my cohort builds houses in quicksand, shouting about statistics and ignorance (as JB hurled at Allie) when the Allies, whatever limitations they have, are at least honest.
Now, JB. JB is expressing what I'd call the "empiricist" retort. This position, like all so-called empirical challenges, is actually a thin veil for a moral challenge. Just come out and say it already! JB finally removes his own mask with the Holocaust argument...hoping, painfully naively, to jolt Allie into realizing he's basically a Nazi. People don't generally react too well to this kind of attack, which is not a reason not to levy it, but actually in this case, it isn't even appropriate. Allie has worked hard and played by the rules, and continues to, to get what he has, and he just doesn't think it's fair that those who commit harm to others get what he's struggled for, for free. There's nothing inherently inhumane about this position. It's politically troubling, if anything, when people are arguing to deny an opportunity for education to other people (when, as JB rightly says, other people want to invest their money this way), when in fact they might direct their anger toward their government that has made higher education an increasingly scarce commodity.
Anyway, let's be clear, Allie's not saying offenders should be exterminated. The Allie's are even oddly ok with paying for inmates to sit around all day, or break stones, at a pricetag of no less than $30K/year, while the job market diminishes and the value of their dollars plunge due to, among other things, too little investment in education and new industry due to, wait, what do the politicians tell us...not enough public funds. It's actually strange to me that the Allies wouldn't be as pissed about the fact that inmates basically do nothing all day long - lounging like an Allie on vacation (no, I'm not saying prison is a holiday, I'll get there in a second) - on their dime, but I digress.
In JB's attempt to avoid the strong moral challenge - that, in fact, contrary to the Allies' beliefs, having done wrong or not, people in prison "deserve" another chance, period, and that much of what landed them in jail were the panoply of things missing from their childhoods (e.g. good schools, caring and stable homes, role models, structure, and realistic future plans) , which we could at least try to supplement if prison is anything but a colossal waste of money. One thing people in the industry have been shouting lately, which I'm not convinced resonates with the Allies but I'll repeat anyway, is that almost all prisoners (97%) WILL get out. So, like it or not, all of our fates are tied to what happens to "them" in prison. If you think sitting around doing nothing, or doing mindless work all day for years on end will best prepare them for the return to society, so be it, but you'll have a hard time finding a single shred of evidence of this in over 200 years of prison history in our nation, and more importantly, it just doesn't make common sense. The Allies usually, as Allie did, suggest deterrence as their empirical base, again in an attempt to avoid their moral challenge (which, to their credit, they do far less frequently than we JBs). This one is pretty weak and I sense the Allies know it. Prison sucks no matter what goes on inside there, and for the kid deciding whether or not to get up in the morning and go to boring school, or hang out with his friends all day and make some real money, the fear of whether long-term institutional confinement involves breaking stones all day or going to college, doesn't weigh in too heavily.
I need to say one slightly off topic thing here for the Allies: you are underestimating the pain of imprisonment. You don't need to make people do laborious work or beat them up to make prison a terrible place. In fact, having them do nothing may be more painful than either of these. If you doubt this at all, do an experiment on yourself. Have a friend lock you in your room, you can even have the internet and books, tv, whatever you like. The only caveat is you tell your friend he is not to let you out no matter what you say, how loud you scream, and only he can decide when the experiment is over. There is something about having your freedom of movement determined by another person that is so grating on the human spirit it is basically unbearable. Believe me, this single fact about confinement, and it is the one quality of imprisonment that is universal, constitutes more than enough punishment for any crime. Now, back to the JBs:
With your strong moral challenge, why not levy it? I've never been sure. Instead, the JBs seem timid and in their timidity, turn to what is unanimous though extremely weak empirical evidence. I warn the JBs, relying on the recidivism stats (Allies should know that no single intervention in prison history has resulted in lowering the recidivism rate of participants more effectively than higher education), fails on two grounds: 1. look at history. We had these numbers in the early '90s when federal funding for ed. in prisons was eliminated. This is a political (i.e. moral) issue, not an empirical one, and 2. the actual science on this stuff is junk. If you push the issue, the other side can easily marshal experts to dispute the scientific claims. No study has EVER dealt with the self-selection issue, and, more problematically, what accounts for someone returning to prison is so complicated, often so far out of the hands of the "offender," it becomes near impossible to attribute causality to any single intervention that goes on while the inmate is incarcerated.
Ok, I just want to reiterate to the JBs', your political position is, in my view, the far stronger one. It is far more inspiring, and thus your support for prisoner higher education should be argued on these grounds. What we need now is not more debate and marshaling of evidence to support our view, but rather a new, reasoned, provocative argument for why it makes sense to invest lots and lots of public money in prisoner education.
Allie,
I have one thing to say about your unthoughtful comment:
Any of these prisoners would trade places with YOU. That is how GOOD they have it.
Allie....first of all yes it does make a difference for the inmates and their families. At least the inmates are trying to correct their mistakes and educating themselves. EDUCATION IS KEY!!!! These inmates are dedicated and are working hard for their degrees, so why don't you focus on spreading your ignorant thoughts to people who aren't behind bars and doing nothing for themselves? Let's not forget these inmates are just as human as you are. EDUCATION IS KEY....behind bars or not!!!!
I'm a social worker - and a right of center Independent. The article clearly states that the program is PRIVATELY funded.
Don't we want those prisoners who are eligible for release returning to society as better, more tolerant, and more productive citizens? This program sounds like an excellent start.
To those who are angry over this program, please come up with better solutions to our nation's problems. If we support and fund programs at the front end (meaning for at-risk children and families), we should be able to reduce delinquency and crime - and as a result, reduce our prison population. We are so often reactive instead of proactive.
Wow - Allie -
I don't know about you, but I think that an intelligent, educated popoulation is certainly more desirable than one that has a "street" education. Wouldn't you rather have less recidivism? Or would you prefer that these people reoffend?
Often, convicted criminals with meaningful jobs become valuable members of society who can teach the young the hard lessons they've learned. I support this program 100% - it's good work.
The holocaust "story" should not have any place in any education.
Well, I did not realize that my comments would stir so many emotions and even instigate an internal debate (see:TJB post). As well-intentinal as your critique of my opinion may be, it appears to be rather naive, based on wishful thinking more than on a fact-based (empirical, per TJB) evidence. Education does not entail intelligence. Education is rather a mean to a goal, or a weapon in the hands of an evil person. I met numbers of well-educated people who were not intelligent and not well-meaning. I am not priviledged. I came to this country with $93 in my pocket and a two and a half year old daughter. You are right, TJB, I am sensitive to the entitlements that this society grants to its criminals since they are much more humane than the same society's respect of its citizens let alone crime victims. I do believe that in all of the responders' naivete, they confuse exceptions with the overwhelming facts. That's why criminals from all over the world consider themselves exceptionally lucky to get into an American prison rather than one on their own soil. Apparently, for them being locked up is not all that bad all other things considered. Honestly, I am not even arguing especially since the article is quite old by now. I am just saying that nothing in your comments made me change my mind.