This time each year, certain students in the Metropolitan College at Boston University have more serious things to worry about than the guest policy or ‘Hell Week.’
They are prisoners at the Massachusetts Correctional Institute at Norfolk and Framingham who are taking liberal arts classes through BU’s Prison Education Program.
And many finish their sentences with a bachelor’s degree from BU under their belt.
The program began in the early 1970s, when a College Bowl quiz show called ‘GE College Bowl’ televised a match between the BU quiz team and a state prison team from MCI-Norfolk. The prison team was reportedly a formidable opponent, having beaten both Harvard and MIT. At the match, English professor Elizabeth Barker was asked an unusual question by one of the members of the prison quiz team.
‘One of the inmates asked an English professor if [the inmates] could read some of their poems, since they had no one there to ask,’ said BU spokesman Kevin Carleton, who once taught at the program. ‘It turned out they were good, so she arranged a poetry reading at the prison. She then asked if she could teach a course at the prison.’
Barker’s request was denied, but she was later given permission when John Silber became BU’s president in 1972.
Since then, several Metropolitan College professors have dedicated their summers to teaching at the prisons. The professors are strictly volunteers for the first five years in the program, and receive a small stipend thereafter.
The program offers a ‘full range of liberal arts classes,’ Carleton said, and students accumulate enough credits to graduate.
‘There were enough inmates who took enough classes to get a bachelor’s degree in liberal arts from Metropolitan College,’ he said.
Despite the difficulties of being in prison, Carleton said inmates make very dedicated students.
‘The environment of the prisons is different than a campus,’ he said. ‘They have very little else to do, and those that are motivated often exhibit a very high degree of motivation.’
Carleton remembered one prisoner he taught, who used the program to make more of his life than he might have without it.
‘One man went through the system to get a GED, then went on to take classes at BU and get a degree,’ he said. ‘After he was released, he volunteered at a prison with veterans, and eventually put himself through the School of Social Work, which is what he is doing now.’
Carleton was surprised and impressed with the transformations the man made.
‘He’s definitely street-tough, but once he gets into classroom mode, he sounds like any academic at BU,’ Carleton said.
While such a metamorphosis is unusual, Carleton said the program has enriched and transformed many prisoners’ lives. Of the 150 students who obtained bachelor’s degrees through the program, only two or three came back to prison. Usually, 30 to 40 percent of released prisoners return, Carleton said.
Carleton said the program is so successful because it provides an opportunity for reform and it stops prisoners from becoming a ‘burden on society.’
‘A common reaction to this program is ‘why should they be rewarded?’ But they’re not being rewarded,’ Carleton said.
‘We are enabling them to make a choice,’ he said, noting that the program does not merely dole out degrees and actually attracts only 10 percent of the two prisons and works with people who have a real motivation and desire to study the liberal arts.
And faculty members have added even more classes recently, initiating ‘what we believe is the first master’s prison program in the country,’ Carleton said.
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