Chi Le
I believe people who are educated always are good in every different situation, including in a jail. Moreover, when prison inmates really repent of their sins, they need to have an opportunity to restart life afresh. The opportunity is given through education, better than from labor jobs, which many prisons are applying over the inmates. If they are paroled with no career, skill, or degree, it is really difficult for them to reintegrate in the free society. Because social benefits of the rehabilitation are over money, I agree that institutions should provide college education programs to prison inmates from available tax dollars of the California state.
An inmate who is a model of a success earned his bachelor’s degree from Roosevelt University while still being in the prison, and now he gets a job in Northwestern University for a study on inner-city Chicago violence. The inmate, McElrath-Bey, got a bachelor’s degree behind bars and integrated into the society with a job in Northwestern University. According to Matthew Fleischer, McElrath-Bey’s success is a model of college education in a prison. He was in the Illinois Department of Corrections when he was 14 years old. And then in the Department, he realized the power of education. After he graduated with a GED, he continued to take college classes in the prison. He felt discovering more than about himself with realizing education as therapeutics. He wanted to be free and self-mastery when he came out. I think his success is only one, but for our society is two because the society loses a crime and adds a useful person. So, Pica has reasons to say, “Every dollar we spend on higher education in prison sees an 18 dollar return” (Fleischer). Pica’s reasons are included the whole society, so the social benefits should be invested by the government from the available tax dollars, rather than from companies. Clearly, the inmate’s rehabilitation brings a big social signification, and it also proves a need of providing college education programs to other prison inmates.
College education programs help inmates have a big opportunity to rehabilitate and reintegrate after they come out. Simply, the programs help to make a big goal for inmates to reeducate and decrease violence. According to “Inside San Quentin Inmates Go to College,” Richard Gonzales tells about an inmate, Chris Deragon, who has served 15 years and is eligible for parole next seven years. Deragon is taking college level courses and hopes to get out of the prison to recover his life. He knows that he is being punished and should not have the right to an education, but he says, “If I'm released onto the street and I'm not educated, then you're just releasing another criminal” (Gonzales). So, the college education program in the prison makes a goal for Deragon to restart his life, rather than there are inmates who fear a day to be paroled without an education, a skill, a means of living. Moreover, Richard Gonzales quotes a state of Scott Kernan, managing day-to-day operations at California's 33 adult prisons, who used to experience a violence, says that the college classes and other programs help to be safe for staffs and make prisons safer. Bobby Evans, who is a tutor for other inmates after earning his degree in the prison at San Quentin, says that new arrivals from other high-level prisons feel a calmer air at San Quentin and don't want to destroy it. So, it's what changing life is (Gonzales). Richard Gonzales concludes, “The program may be helping to change attitudes inside the prison, but there are no rigorous studies yet that show.” Therefore, the college education programs are a big goal for inmates to strive for their useful life and decrease violence.
In another case, a father graduates from college in the prison without a hope to be able to find a job as an ex-con after being paroled, but he is inspiring for his daughter to pursue a goal of a community college. Simply, he is a model of his daughter to restart her life. Richard Gonzales tells about Felix Lucero, who went to prison when his daughter, Desiree Lucero, was just a year old. After 17 years, his lessons in school behind bars changed his relationship with his daughter. He said, “The more I learned stuff, the more I wanted to give it to her” (Gonzales). When Desiree Lucero has downfall in high school, she turns her mind to the father what he did in the prison. And then she realizes she can restart her life as her father began 17 years ago. Her father is a model of restarting life afresh and is inspiring for her. So, the model is great for what a prison inmate makes for her daughter after finishing some lessons in school behind bars.
However, there is a different idea which doesn’t agree to provide more money than to prisons. Hansook Oh and Mona Adem say that because of lack of fund to college, the public four-year institutions increase tuition and fees to lead low-income and poor students cannot afford to go to school. They add that $1 billion allocated to prisons is too much if compared higher education received, and “charging students more for their studies, the government will gain more money and use it to supplement lacking tax revenue.” In fact, according to Association of International Educators NAFSA, in 2012-2013 academic year, foreign students in the United States contribute about $24 billion to the national economy, including $3.7 billion here in California State, and the amount is increasing yearly. Moreover, the government is still prioritizing public education and making the institution very affordable. I believe that all low-income and poor students in California have a fee waiver to ensure access to the college, and a financial aid helps the students fund their higher education as a subsidization of the federal government. Cleary, the California government has full of its duties for higher education, so it should also have a strong budget of college education programs for prison inmates. Therefore, using tax dollars available to provide the programs to prison inmates is the best resolution.
I believe many people don’t mind paying their taxes to those who are using them to make the society better. I advocate providing education programs to prison inmates who have a desire to be educated because the inmates will restart their life significantly, such as McElrath-Bey, Chris Deragon, Bobby Evans, and Felix Lucero. And then the taxes are used significantly to help the prison inmates rehabilitate and reintegrate to the free society. In the prison can be an ideal place for study, of course, people don’t want to jail to learn, but if they are in jail, they have more time, accept fate, and calm in mind. Through papers, I know many world leaders used to study in a prison, such as Nelson Mandela, Mahatma Gandhi, and Martin Luther King, Jr. So, a prison could be a good place to practice one’s will and ideal to fulfill a great intention.
Reference
http://www.npr.org/2011/06/20/137176620/inside-san-quentin-inmates-go-to-college
No comments:
Post a Comment