Jessicah Lahitou looks at the benefits to innovation for difficult-to-solve problems such as prison reform.
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Out of the regular slog of disappointment churning round and round the news cycle, it is time now for a moment of celebration. The face off between three inmates from the Eastern New York Correctional Facility and Harvard’s lauded debate team gives everyone reason to take a momentary aside to smile.
Not only did the prison team win, they won arguing for a problematic (to say the least) position. They were tasked with proving that illegal immigrants should not be allowed to attend public schools. This is hardly an easy or noble stance to defend.
Yet the triumphant team came at their challenge with an innovative idea. If public schools rejected illegal immigrants, then non-profits and other charitable organizations would step in, and provide those children with what would probably amount to a better education. An added benefit, they argued, would be that overcrowded, under-funded public schools (cleverly termed “dropout factories”) would be better able to focus on the students already on their rosters.
The prison debaters are all part of the Bard Prison Initiative, a program through Bard College that offers degrees to its 300 enrolled students. And the benefits of this type of intervention are stunning.
According to the Bard Prison Initiative webpage, 68% of released prisoners will be rearrested within three years. The percent of Bard students? Less than 2%.
The American incarceration system is not only large, but very costly. So coming from the economic angle, Bard’s program is a success.
But the more exhilarating angle is in the program’s recognition of prisoners as humans. As people not only capable of learning, but desirous of doing so. According to Bard, they receive ten applications for every one spot that opens up. And their curriculum is clearly challenging. For any debate team to beat Harvard, the standards must be extremely high.
So hats off to the debaters from Eastern New York’s Correctional Facility. And a second hats off to Bard College, for offering such a needed program to New York’s prison populations. May your example quickly inspire others to do the same.