TECHNOLOGY EDUCATION FOR INCARCERATED PERSONS Shannon Johnson, Pamela Lopez, Heather Michel, Matthew Montemurno, Vanita Murray and Leslie Pope OMDE 606 Group 3

JUSTIFICATION 2.2 million people in the United States are incarcerated in either prison or jail It has been shown that incarcerated people who had taken academic or vocational courses were 46% less likely to return to criminal behavior than those who had not taken college courses Inmates who had participated in academic or vocational programs while incarcerated had a 13% higher rate of employment than those who did not participate in educational offerings while in the prison system.

SCOPE OF THE COURSE A technology career program has been approved with a partnership between several dual-mode community colleges and the Maryland State Prison system Eligible inmates must hold a GED or high school diploma and have at least 6-24 months left of their sentence Three-credit course Requires 170 hours of study time – 10 hours of study per week over 17 weeks Course offered twice a year Course is expected to enroll 210 students per year

THE COURSE Course Description The Technology Career Training Program is designed to enable inmates to gain skills needed to pursue employment outside of the prison system. Course Objectives As a result of completing this program, inmates will be able to: Efficiently communicate with employers verbally and in written form Navigate Microsoft Office to generate and utilize documents Solve employment case studies

The course will provide inmates with flexible learning   Synchronously – the inmates will be able to chat with faculty Student-Instructor Interaction Asynchronously - the inmates can view podcasts Student-Content Interaction Flexible Learning

COURSE MANAGEMENT Course Manager – two-thirds per annual time Administrative Staff – one full-time Correctional Facility Staff – one full-time Tutor – two tutors per course one-third per annual time one tutor per 25 students

COURSE MATERIALS 12 Study guides – 75 pages each One reader (200-pages) Five apps Tablets Video Podcasts

STUDENT SUPPORT Students will have access and will be supported by two tutors – one per 25 students Students will be assessed on the basis of seven assignments that will be marked by the tutors

Cutting edge technology will be used throughout the course Tablets – Ten Incarcerated Persons Education Pads (iPEP) developed by Union Supply in collaboration with the Correctional Education Association Learning Management System – Moodle – an open source platform for course development and management.

BUDGET The program has been approved to receive $535, 518 in grant monies from the NRRC Second Chance Act Technology Career Training Grant Program

LIST OF INGREDIENTS As you can see the list of ingredients are complete with a list of overheads to include the course manager, administrative support staff and correctional facility staff- recurrent cost are $125, 000, fixed costs of development, fixed costs of maintenance , total fixed costs, total variable costs per student are all highlighted as well as the costs per student per credit hour

COSTING

GRAPHS

CHALLENGES Supplementing this program into the multitude of existing prison programs College level or graduate level courses are not easily available for inmates The Second Act Bill that could be repealed by Congress

CONCLUSION The proposed technology career training program will assist with the effort of giving inmates a second chance to be financially-independent, productive members of society. The program will reach its breakeven point in the middle of its third year with 508.1 students. The program will continue to profit for years after.