1. Expanding engineering education to the incarcerated population
Keywords: prison education, college-in-prison programs, mass incarceration, social justice
Expanding engineering education to the incarcerated population
Timothy Bretl
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

2. Why? The system of incarceration in the United States needs reform.
The mission of the Education Justice Project is to create a model college-in-prison program that demonstrates the positive impacts of higher education upon incarcerated people, their families, the communities from which they come, and society as a whole.
A 10-minute video about this work:

3. When?
(2006) Formation of a prison education working group at the University of Illinois by Prof. Rebecca Ginsburg.
(2008) Launch of the Education Justice Project.
(2009) For-credit classes offered at Danville Correctional Center, a medium-security adult male prison.
(2013) For-credit engineering classes offered.
My contribution has included teaching two for-credit semester-long courses, “Introduction to Robotics” (ECE470, Spring 2013, enrollment 12) and “Aerospace Control Systems” (AE353, Spring 2016, enrollment 4) to men at Danville Correctional Center.
EJP has a rich history and offers many other programs:

4. Where?
All for-credit courses offered by the Education Justice Project have so far been taught at the Danville Correctional Center, a medium-security adult male prison that is 30 miles east of the Urbana-Champaign campus.
A strategic goal is to establish a degree-granting program, offering a B.A. or B.S. from U. Illinois, for men at this prison.

5. What? The prison environment presents unique challenges:
Class is limited to one evening every week for three hours.
Students have no access to internet and cannot communicate with me (or each other, in most cases) outside of class.
Class may be cancelled or cut short at any time (shift rotation, hostage drill, roll miscount, missing identity card, etc.).
Students have access to a computer lab, but only three hours each week.
No electronic materials can be brought in or out of the prison.
Course materials must be cleared by prison staff two weeks before use.
Educational background varies widely—for example, because many students were incarcerated as teenagers—particularly in math and science.
Conditions for students are often poor in prison—for example, overcrowding is a problem—and may negatively impact academic work.
These challenges force those involved with prison education to work hard on teaching practice (to be creative and flexible, to be patient and responsive to individual students, to be prepared, etc.) with unusual care and intention.

6. Prognosis?
Pell Grants to fund higher education are available again for incarcerated men and women (after having been eliminated in 1994). It is a great time to get involved in this work.
Leadership and support is available from the Education Justice Project to support efforts on other campuses to develop independent college-in-prison programs.
Help is needed to establish programs for successful re-entry of men and women upon their release from prison (and, perhaps, their subsequent enrollment at universities).
Teaching in prison raises a number of questions about education and society that may be worth discussing. Should engineering be taught in prison? What is the responsibility of a public university to educate incarcerated men and women? What is the purpose of engineering education for those who may never be employed as engineers? Etc.