05/21/2021
Congratulations to CIE and partners on the Mutual Mentoring Team Grant! https://www.umass.edu/faculty-development/mutual-mentoring-grant-program/mutual-mentoring-team-grant
For the last several years, faculty across UMass have been periodically teaching in the Hampshire County Jail and House of Corrections, the Western Massachusetts Regional Women’s Correctional Center, and the Franklin County Jail. Some faculty offered full courses (including a course that enrolled an equal number of UMass students and incarcerated students), and others offered lectures around particular topics. Incarcerated students, UMass students, jail administrators, and faculty all expressed great enthusiasm for these programs.
In the fall of 2019, the core faculty and mentoring partners on this grant began meeting to discuss institutionalizing a UMass Prison Education Initiative and ensuring tuition and fees would be waived for incarcerated students, the latter of which was approved by the Provost in spring 2020.
The central mentoring challenges we seek to address involve preparing UMass faculty to teach effectively in jail and prison, to administer an expanded prison education program, and to provide a support network for faculty interested in teaching in jail or prison. To be sure, there is a wide range of pedagogical models of prison education, ranging from one-off lectures, to “inside-out” courses that enroll both incarcerated students and students from UMass, to courses offered only to incarcerated students.
Further, there is a variety of training programs associated with prison education, with perhaps the most notable being the Inside-Out Prison Exchange Program. We are seeking to create a mentoring network that will be able to address these challenges.
Congratulations to CIE and partners on the Mutual Mentoring Team Grant! https://www.umass.edu/faculty-development/mutual-mentoring-grant-program/mutual-mentoring-team-grant
For the last several years, faculty across UMass have been periodically teaching in the Hampshire County Jail and House of Corrections, the Western Massachusetts Regional Women’s Correctional Center, and the Franklin County Jail. Some faculty offered full courses (including a course that enrolled an equal number of UMass students and incarcerated students), and others offered lectures around particular topics. Incarcerated students, UMass students, jail administrators, and faculty all expressed great enthusiasm for these programs.
In the fall of 2019, the core faculty and mentoring partners on this grant began meeting to discuss institutionalizing a UMass Prison Education Initiative and ensuring tuition and fees would be waived for incarcerated students, the latter of which was approved by the Provost in spring 2020.
The central mentoring challenges we seek to address involve preparing UMass faculty to teach effectively in jail and prison, to administer an expanded prison education program, and to provide a support network for faculty interested in teaching in jail or prison. To be sure, there is a wide range of pedagogical models of prison education, ranging from one-off lectures, to “inside-out” courses that enroll both incarcerated students and students from UMass, to courses offered only to incarcerated students.
Further, there is a variety of training programs associated with prison education, with perhaps the most notable being the Inside-Out Prison Exchange Program. We are seeking to create a mentoring network that will be able to address these challenges.
