|
|
|
|
September 20, 2004
MMC Manages New York’s Only Women's Prison Education Program
 |
(New York, NY) A few years ago, the college program at Bedford Hills Correctional Facility for Women in Westchester County, N.Y., the only women's prison college program left in the state and one of the few left in the nation, was in danger of being shut down. Today, it is flourishing, and now it has come under the management of Marymount Manhattan College, with continuing support from a consortium of area colleges.
Currently, more than 150 inmates are enrolled in the program, said Judson R. Shaver, President of Marymount Manhattan. Shaver credits the hard work and dedication of the Women's Prison Education Partnership, a group of community leaders, the prison superintendent and the inmates themselves who have guided the program for the past few years. He also cites volunteers and the nine consortium colleges with keeping the program strong. However, given the Partnership's lean operation and limited resources, Marymount Manhattan, which grants degrees in the program, offered to assume management responsibility.
"This will be a seamless transition," said Shaver. "I have asked Barbara Hack, a trustee of both Marymount Manhattan and the Partnership, to direct the transition of the program. Moreover, members of the Partnership board will be advisors to the program, and our academic partners remain committed. I want to thank all of them for helping us get through a difficult period and emerge stronger than ever."
Shaver said research done in the late 1990s by The Graduate Center of the City University of New York and the New York State Department of Correctional Services showed that the Bedford Hills program transforms lives, reduces re-incarceration rates, creates safer prisons and communities, and reduces the need for tax dollars spent on prisons. "According to the report, for every 100 college students educated in prison, approximately $900,000 in tax dollars now dedicated to prisons can be saved over two years through reduced re-incarceration rates," he said. "Imagine the savings if college were offered to more of the men and women incarcerated in New York State and around the nation."
In 1982, there were more than 350 college programs in prisons throughout the U.S. In 1994, President Clinton signed the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act, which denied prisoners access to federal Pell Grants. Like most other states, New York withdrew its support for college in prisons. Nationwide, all but eight of the existing women prison college programs were dismantled. Bedford Hills, New York's maximum-security program for women, is the only program to survive in New York State, thanks to the grassroots effort.
Shaver said the Bedford Hills inmates work all day at their prison assignments, and then find the energy and dedication to attend college classes in the evening. In the past six years, Marymount Manhattan College has granted 35 associates' degrees and 16 bachelors' degrees.
"When these graduates are released, they are able to use their education to obtain employment, to regain custody of their children (more than 70% of the college students are mothers), and to live with dignity and worth," Shaver said. "As one of the recent college graduates said, ‘I will always have a record, I know I can never get rid of that; but I will also always have a college degree and no one can take that away from me either.'"
Even those women who do not remain at Bedford Hills long enough to earn a degree benefit from the program. A study conducted by CUNY has shown that "women who attend college in prison, whether they obtain degrees or simply earn credits toward a degree, are far less likely to be re-incarcerated than those who did not: eight percent vs. 29 percent.
"I continue to believe that the strength of the program lies in the efforts of our consortium, said Shaver. "Our collective strength reflects the leadership and support upon which this program depends. We have established a strong presence not only at Bedford Hills, but also in the larger community, thereby allowing this important work to continue and thrive."
Consortium members, which support the program financially and through faculty participation, include Bank Street College of Education, Barnard College, Manhattanville College, Marymount College of Fordham University, Mercy College, New York University, Pace University and Sarah Lawrence College. Metropolitan College is set to join the consortium this year.
|
|
|
|
|
