And I always remember, no, no, no. Confronted with the "inhuman monotony" of life behind bars, Mr. Hall became a serious student, ultimately gaining admission to the Bard Prison Initiative, a competitive, full-time degree program run by Bard College. MAX KENNER: Welcome to Bard College. In one of our most power episodes ever, BPIs founder Max Kenner and recent graduate Sebastian Yoon join Adam this week to discuss howReadMore, One graduate, featured in a new PBS documentary, shares the ups and downs of earning a degree behind bars. I'm not going to wear that. I'm a son. Did you feel yourself changing as you moved through these courses? This is the thing we know how to do, and we happen to do it here. I went on to work for Congressman Sean Patrick Maloney on his attorney general campaign here in New York. TATRO: You know, this - I'm the first person in my family who's ever gone to college. Funding provided by Bank of America, Ford Foundation / JustFilms, National Endowment for the Humanities, Meg & Tomas Bergstrand, Regina K. Scully, The Lise Strickler & Mark Gallogly Charitable Fund, a fund at The New York Community Trust, Patty Quillin through the Meadow Fund at Silicon Valley Community Foundation, Barbara & Richard Novick, Chicken & Egg Pictures, The William H. Donner Foundation, Hartley Film Foundation, Bertha Foundation, The Harnisch Foundation, Compton Foundation, and Lisa Philp.And members of The Better Angels Society: John & Catherine Debs, The Cousins Foundation, Inc., Abrams Foundation, Schwartz/Reisman Foundation, Ted Dintersmith & Elizabeth Hazard, McCloskey Family Charitable Trust, and Donna & Dick Strong. College Behind Bars, a four-part documentary film series directed by award-winning filmmaker Lynn Novick, produced by Sarah Botstein, and executive produced by Ken Burns, tells the story of a. College Behind Bars. A new PBS documentary series follows prisoners who earn college degrees while serving time. College Behind Bars is perhaps one of the best documentaries that Ive seen about criminal justice in the past 5 years. SERIOUS READING I dont watch TV. As public funding of college-in-prison returns to the field the question shifts from Will there be college-in-prison? The documentary prompts viewers to consider the importance of higher education in prison. YOON: But to those who would ask that question, Dave, you could also ask them, would you ask the same question of students who are out here? And I think it bred for me empathy, which is something that I didn't have a lot of when I was a teenager. And I am the most proud father in the world. And so I was a little bit intimidated by that. Well, you know, for a number of the graduates - and this was true of Sebastian, not Dyjuan - there was this - there's this terrible paradox where, you know, the fact that you are completing your college degree and graduating doesn't mean that you are released from prison. College Behind Bars, an Emmy-nominated, four-part documentary about the transformative power of education. And, you know, one of the just greatest moments there is that when the BPI students were getting up to walk the stage, the president of the college, Leon Botstein, said - you know, he said these are some of our most distinguished and greatest students, and the whole student body stood and gave us a resounding round of applause. (SOUNDBITE OF MARCUS ROBERTS' "IT'S MARIA'S DANCE"). Lacy Aaron Schmidt was just 14 when he murdered his ex-girlfriend, Alana Calahan, in Columbia County, Georgia. Ken Burns is executive producer. 27 2023 . I remember telling my professor that, how can I complete an eight-page paper if I feel like I could complete it in only two? I'm a math major, went on after that to do some project management and data collection for a tech company and then started thinking about how I could get back in the world. Through the personal stories of the students and their families, the film reveals the transformative power of higher education and puts a human face on Americas criminal justice crisis. college behind bars where are they now college behind bars where are they now. And Max Kenner, who is the founder and executive director of the program, is welcoming the new students. TATRO: You know, one of the great things about, you know, Bard is that it's recognized that it's not enough just to, you know, kind of issue a degree and give someone an education, send them back out into society. DAVIES: Sebastian Yoon, tell us what it was like getting started in these classes. Tune in for an unparalleled look inside @BPIBard, one of the most rigorous & challenging #CollegeInPrison programs. I mean, you both entered prison as teenagers, right? Turkish prisons do not have a specific policy regarding children, but in general, they are not allowed in prison. And what the film shows and the work at BPI shows is that that cannot be more untrue. For 26 years, BPI joined other advocates in championing the return of Pell eligibility for incarcerated students. But in reality, out here, the degrees matter. So I walked out of prison on August 10 of 2017, and I was back in college on August 24 finishing my B.A. Most had circumstances early in their life, which were really, really tough, heartbreaking in many cases. This is FRESH AIR. DAVIES: And if you're in class when it's time for a count, what happens? Become a BPI supporter today and join a passionate community that believes in the power of education. Simpson and Fritsch have a new book called "Crime In Progress." And you can learn grammar. But as we got to know the students, we began to understand the circumstances of their lives, which, as you say, were complicated, sometimes tragic, often involved exposure to violence and other tragic experiences. DAVIES: Wow, that's really remarkable. Copyright 2019 NPR. I believe that me having committed a crime doesn't make me a bad person. When incarcerated students from the Bard Prison Initiative (BPI) Debate Union beat a team from Harvard, their victory made headlines around the world. When kids stopped bothering me, I guess I started feeling this false sense of empowerment. So we really take the opportunity that we had seriously and try to give back in real, tangible ways to the wider population. Parts One & Two. The journey to bring "College Behind Bars" started in 2012, when Novick and producer Sarah Botstein were invited to give a lecture for BPI students. But one of the things that was also great - there are instances where the other prisoners would accommodate us, where they would say, you know, the Bard guys are working at this table; let's go over here and make noise, or, like, the Bard guys are in the room - in their rooms studying. The doc is also a moving portrait of individuals determined to defy the odds and build a better future for themselves.. You know, it's interesting. Let's get back to the interview FRESH AIR's Dave Davies recorded with Lynn Novick, director of the new PBS documentary "College Behind Bars," and Sebastian Yoon and Dyjuan Tatro, two graduates of the Bard Prison Initiative. But I had no life experience to bring to that. And you see this room, and then all of a sudden, reality just comes crashing upon you. DAVIES: And have you both stayed in touch with folks you knew from the program and helped - people you helped? And then you say, oh, this is my reality. The Bard Prison Initiative enrolls over 300 incarcerated students in six New York State prisons. That kind of thing. But I needed that degree in order to get my first interview, and then I went to four more interviews after that where I was able to prove myself through speech. After returning home, BPI alumni become independent taxpaying citizens. In August 2022, BPI joined colleagues across the field in issuing public comments in response to the Department of Educations proposed regulatory language. College Behind Bars remains - especially in the first episode - admirably focused on the practicalities of prison life and prison programmes. That's how I got my job at Open Society Foundations. This movement took on renewed urgency following Congresss reinstatement of Pell Grant access to incarcerated students in 2020. 2023 Public Broadcasting Service (PBS). As they begin their studies at Eastern and Taconic Correctional facilities, they discover that they will be held to the same high standards as Bard College students on the main campus in Annandale-on-Hudson. NOVICK: Yeah. The numbers that I remember from the documentary was that at - there were about 890 or so in the institution, 110 in the program, which is a pretty good number. It raises questions we urgently need to address: What is prison for? The BPI student body mirrors that of the prison system at large: students come from communities with the fewest quality educational opportunities that are most impacted by crises of hyper-policing and mass incarceration. And then they're like, strip. College Behind Bars is an intimate look at the lives and experiences of a dozen BPI students and their families that confronts . And this is not obviously the happiest part of your life, but - and you can say as much as you want about it, but I think the audience would be interested in knowing a bit about what your life was like coming up. I'm interested in your take on this - whether vocational programs should be there. The type of things that are available to people in prison currently are somewhat outdated. You are Korean American, right? They love the Bard Prison Initiative. We see him, don't we? And you can just see it. So let's just listen to this. And with time, as we become scholars, the idea that we should be limited to just vocational training just becomes absurd. So I know when I was in college and I was reading Greek tragedy or Shakespeare or, you know, classic texts, it was just an assignment to me. Ill take care of the preliminaries, brush my teeth, get dressed, and I shoot straight to the Starbucks two blocks away. Part 1: 'No One Ever Taught Me Any of That.'. Prison is not an easy place to get an education. James Herriots adventures as a veterinarian in 1930s Yorkshire get a new TV adaptation. You're looking ahead. They work in business, the arts, and media; they attend graduate school; they have careers in human services. : r/loveafterlockup. danville jail mugshots; marlin 1898 stock; So that was, like, really, really kind of humbling to see that type of support from the general population. Im trying to act younger than my age, so I sometimes listen to trap music. Fact: The College: Comprehensive Academic Engagement. In 2016, BPI was proud to join the first cohort of sites receiving experimental eligibility through Second Chance Pell. Rodney has been incarcerated for 17 years and is currently incarcerated at Fishkill. You can see then Minister. You know, I would go in and do all the work in a day or two, and the expectations were really, really low. They study math, as Dyjuan said, languages, history, literature, art, science, philosophy, economics, public policy, you know, public health. So once that happened, almost all those programs vanished - went from about 800 programs to fewer than 10. Incarcerated men and women in New York State are admitted to the Bard Prison Initiative (BPI), one of the most rigorous college programs in America. Funding for College Behind Bars is provided by Bank of America; PBS; Ford Foundation / JustFilms; National Endowment for the Humanities; Meg & Tomas Bergstrand; Regina K. Scully; The Lise More, Funding for College Behind Bars is provided by Bank of America; PBS; Ford Foundation / JustFilms; National Endowment for the Humanities; Find standards-aligned teaching resources for DAVIES: And that's from the documentary "College Behind Bars," directed by our guest Lynn Novick. It's about a program in which professors of Bard College give college classes in six correctional institutions. I always thought that my logic and my feelings trumped others - no pun intended. College Behind Bars (two hours) begins Monday at 9 p.m. with Parts 1 and 2 on WETA and MPT. But that means a lot that weren't - probably some applied and did not get in. NOVICK: You know, Sarah and I, when we got into the project, we were focusing on the transformational aspect of it, power of education, and what did it mean to get this education while in prison? But the Allens still have mixed feelings about free degrees for inmates. They have both been to prison. My colleagues are aware of different types of cuisine and restaurants and whenever we travel together for work or have a lunch together, theres this tendency to talk about food and wine. My father never saw me as a bad person. DAVIES: Yeah, it was interesting. Lynn Novick, Sebastian Yoon and Dyjuan Tatro, welcome to FRESH AIR. So I grew up in Flushing, Queens. Episodes. NOVICK: Yeah. Add College Behind Bars to your must watch list! So there was this kind of seamless movement from one setting to another. I never saw a class where people weren't paying attention - not one - and we were in a lot of classes. So it totally enthralled me and motivated me to go after this education with pure zeal. 4/22/2019 The PBSand Emmy-nominated documentary "College Behind Bars" seeks to showcase the students of BPI as well as the need for more prison college programs throughout the country. Let's listen. I'm going to get emotional. One of the Bard professors said, you know, I don't have all these multimedia tools that you do in a big institution, but when you're in a class where everybody's done the reading, you don't need them as much. DAVIES: This is FRESH AIR, and we're discussing the new four-part PBS documentary "College Behind Bars." More than 2 million Americans are incarcerated today, and many are looking for alternatives to prison and ways to help offenders rebuild their lives. 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