KC Could Get A College Degree In Prison For Free - Thoughts Please

[Just Jayla]

My sister lived for a long time in CA and was involved in victim's rights orgs after being forewoman on a murder trial jury. She used to tell me stories about how there are actually newsletters for inmates on how to handle their INVESTMENTS while in prison. Some of them get govt money for various things. It's just appalling.

KC never left home so really for her, this is more like being grounded or something, only without CA being there (and that she has to eat grits) and without having to babysit her own daughter (which is I'm sure how she thought of taking care of Caylee).

I'm sorry but I don't think we've proved that much rehabilitation takes place in prisons and I'd rather see any extra money spent on their comfort or their education being spent on restitution to victims. If our tax dollars are spent to allow them to get a higher education then they should be obligated to use that to give back to society.

Habitat for Humanity has prison programs in IL and CO in which inmates volunteer to make cabinets and walls or other wood items for the homes. Some even make dollhouses that are sold to raise money for the houses. Oprah had a show recently where Glenn Close talked about a program in NY I believe in which selected inmates spend two years raising and training service dogs for returning disabled war veterans.

Darn it, if we are going to house inmates for at least an average cost of over $40k per year (and that is not the ones with special requirements like protective custody, etc), then I think anything above and beyond three squares a day and a decent cell should come at a price to them. If we are going to pay for an advanced degree then I think they should be required to use it for community service of some sort. Particularly with law degrees; they should be required to assist attorneys on pro bono cases (writing briefs, doing research, anything) to help the unfortunate or victims of crimes.

There are people in this economy who have never committed a crime but who are forced to sleep in their cars and dumpster dive for food, some of them with minimum wage jobs, some of them old or ill. They probably look at a life in which you get to sit in a cell and get three meals a day, free medical care, time for a little exercise and free TV and the ability to spend your day lounging or reading books as a dream existence.

What's wrong with this picture??

:clap::clap::clap: Having criminals pay back their debt to society as well as the deterence factor of hard time are simple notions and work well....Being merciful is up to the rest of us (being able to watch TV in lieu of reading newspapers and books while in jail is well beyond merciful)

 

[Boston]

My own personal opinion on educational services for inmates is this....

If a person is serving a life sentence for a Violent crime then I believe it is a total & complete waste of Tax payers money to pay for any type of education or training.

However, I also believe that if you have a "Non-violent offender" who is serving a relatively short sentence then it would be far cheaper, in the long run, to offer that inmate a chance to improve his prospects at becoming a productive member of society by paying for an education or job training than it is to let an "Institutionalized" inmate back into society were he is very likely to become a repeat offender.

Would you rather 'Invest" in an inmates education now & give him the chance to rehabilitate himself or pay to incarcerate that inmate for life?

Of course this all depends on the type of crime they commit & wether or not that inmate even has the ability to be rehabilitated so close attention should be paid to identifying inmates who fit that criteria.

If we allow our prisons to become "Black Holes" with the worst possible conditions & a place were inmates are simply "Punished" then I can assure you that when those inmates are released back into "our neighborhoods" they will re-offend & the crimes they commit will become progressively worse.

And the more crimes they commit the more victims they will leave in their wake.

 

[yolorado]

One thing I think is forgotten is the the Correction's Officers in all this. While people want most prisoners to be denied basic human rights (not talking about school) the prisoners become less and less human and much more difficult to control and monitor. If you treat people like animals they become animals. JMHO of course.
I would think the job of a CO would become increasingly more and more difficult if inmates were treated the way many would like them treated and for that reason i have no problem giving inmates certain perks.

In CA prisons you can no longer smoke. Smoking has been banned in our jails for a very long time but was only banned in our prisons in the last few years.
I was talking to one CO and he said they were all dreading the change because imagine hundreds if not thousands of violent offenders all having to quit smoking at the same time! He said it was the most difficult time of his career. In the jails they let them keep what the cigs they had, but no more could be brought in. When it got to the end and a few inmates had kept a stash and other inmates couldn't get any more they became a hot item with fights and more escalating. they finally had to confiscate the remainder because it was too hard for the CO's to deal with.

My point is that the less we give the prisoners, the more difficult the job is for the CO's and I think that should be a factor for consideration when determining what inmates can and cannot do. Education may serve a purpose for some inmates but not others.

This is the problem. We want criminals to pay but we mustn't do that at the expense of the officers watching over them. To me, smoking in jail doesn't seem like something that should be prohibited and it seems like most prisoners would be less of a problem with something to occupy their time and energy. In today's world though, you'd probably end up with a law suit asserting that people where killed from second hand smoke. Prison administration must be a tough road to walk.

 

[AZRiverRat]

I'm all for the education of Casey. Too bad she will never have the conscience and soul she so desperately lacks.

 

[debbie0604]

It doesn't really bother me if KC were to receive a "law degree" while in prison...because #1 she would have to finish high school first and #2 proceed on through the prerequisite college courses and #3 take the law courses and then #4 pass the Bar exam which I understand is extremely difficult to do, and my question is this... How could a convicted felon apply and pass the Bar exam? Then...let's say for example..she were to only receive a 20-30 year sentence, she were to be released years later, how would she be able to practice law? I don't see her being able to use her "so-called" law degree. A convicted child murderer who murdered her own child practicing law? I don't think so.. JMO...

I can definitely see how the free education irks some people, but it just doesn't bother me... to be honest, I think after she's convicted and the trial is over and the media goes away...she'll find something else to bide her time.. and it won't be an education. That's just my opinion though.

 

[YellowDog]

It wouldn't bother me. Aren't prisons supposed to try to rehabilitate prisoners?

 

[Ms.Heather]

I did some research on FL prisons and found a site that answered many questions about what inmates there have and don't have. This is part of a Q & A on FL prisons...Link at bottom.

What determines what prison you go to?

DOC does.

Can you smoke in prison?

Yes as long as you are not inside of any building. That goes for all forms of tobacco.

Can you have a television in your cell?

No. There is only one in each dayroom and depending on which institution you go to it could be the officers or the inmates that determine what you watch.

Do they offer college courses?

No. They have a few camps with vocational programs but good luck getting into one.

http://www.prisontalk.com/forums/archive/index.php/t-400487.html

That site is an great site, with LOTS of helpful information with regards to prisons all around the world.

IMO, You know... KC can do programs through the mail to earn whatever degree she wants. I believe she will be spending her life behind bars, I don't think she will get DP, I think she will get Life without parole...which is fine by me. So, even if she has degrees in 3 fields she'll never get to do anything with her life... but she will probably tell other prisoners that she still works, just from behind bars, yanno... through the mail. LOL.

KC wouldn't be able to do this for free. Someone would have to pay for it, and it wouldn't be the tax payers. It would be family.

 

[Ms.Heather]

It wouldn't bother me. Aren't prisons supposed to try to rehabilitate prisoners?

Thats it. Prison is for rehabilitation. No matter what gruesome act that person did to end up there, the point of it all is to rehabilitate. Not that KC will ever end up back on the streets... but when prisons fail to do this, we end up with high recidivism rates.

 

[jeepgirlva]

IMHO education should be allowed in prison's... set up libraries(use books ) class rooms even allow prisoners teaching other prisoners to read,math... I could even see settting up book clubs.... I rather see education then say cable tv....I've heard (newspaper and Oprah)about a program where death row inmates train services dogs for handicapped people which is pretty cool idea... I'm all for prisoners giving back..now I don't think taxpayers should be burden with KC getting a law degree it's enough to pay for bologna and cheese sandwiches and grits for her ...which makes me wonder if she has to clean bathrooms or the kitchen or cook?

 

[cecybeans]

Thats it. Prison is for rehabilitation. No matter what gruesome act that person did to end up there, the point of it all is to rehabilitate. Not that KC will ever end up back on the streets... but when prisons fail to do this, we end up with high recidivism rates.

I agree, although it is highly debated that they do. Actually, that is a more enlightened and recent view of incarceration, the original point of which is to remove people from society so they do not do further damage.

I'm all for rehabilitating but I think that until a college degree proves that it does actually rehabilitate (and does not just prepare them for a life of white collar crime), I think it would be wise to test how rehabilitated they actually are but insisting that they use their degrees to do something more than prepare their own appeal or become financially savvy enough to handle their own investments. I'd be willing to pay for their higher education when I'm sure that it is not denied to every other human being in the country first.

 

[akashana]

Thats it. Prison is for rehabilitation. No matter what gruesome act that person did to end up there, the point of it all is to rehabilitate. Not that KC will ever end up back on the streets... but when prisons fail to do this, we end up with high recidivism rates.

Some people will never be rehabilitated, and that is acknowledged by the administration. Prisons first and foremost are there to remove the offender from society and an opportunity to victimize somebody else. Punishment and rehabilitation, while not mutually exclusive, do not always occur in tandem. There are those who can never, should never, be released into the world again. What purpose would it be to give Charles Manson a college degree even if his mental and psychological deficiencies would permit it? Everyone knows, including Charles Manson, that no matter how many parole hearings he has, he will never get out. I've read that he doesn't even bother to attend them anymore. So the line is drawn in the sand at some point regarding who can and should get an education on the taxpayer's dime. In most but not all cases we are not talking about college degrees anyway. Most prisoners take vocational courses and remedial instruction to get GEDs, and often their instructors are other more educated inmates who may get cents on the dollar per hour to teach them. So we aren't necessasarily talking a lot of money being spent on education.

I think that those prisons who have programs like those mentioned by an earlier poster where inmates train service dogs and make furniture for Habitat for Humanity homes are on the right track. It gives them a skill set and in the case of the dogs, gives them something to care about and love, while at the same time allows them to give back to society. I'm sure it raises self esteem and morale also; that just makes good sense. Obviously not every prisoner can or should meet the criteria for these programs. Some will die there never having learned a thing that will better themselves or society, and others will leave there one day changed for the better by their experiences. Take a youthful drug offender who was a high school drop out and turned to slinging dope for the easy buck. Put him in prison and teach him to read, to calculate math. Then teach him a trade like auto mechanics or carpentry or air conditioning repair. When he is let loose one day on society he will now have an option to a life of crime. Whether he chooses that option or not is up to him, but I for one don't begrudge him the opportunity to learn something that can change his life for the better.