Inmates at the Massachusetts Correctional Institute (MCI) in Shirley, Massachusetts can now apply to take Boston College (BC) accredited liberal-arts courses.
The program, Boston College’s Prison Education Program (BCPEP), launched in September as part of a nationwide group of correctional education programs under the Bard Prison Initiative (BPI). Since its establishment in 1999 at Bard College, BPI has issued over 50,000 credits and 550 degrees.
“It was founded really in a recognition of the confluence of two essential social crises in the United States,” said Max Kenner, executive director at BPI. “The first being what we now call mass incarceration and the other, being the way we provide higher education in a democratic and accessible way to diverse communities within the United States.”
The program’s courses are taught by BC instructors and based on similar curriculum to those used in traditional undergraduate classes. This semester, available courses include introductory philosophy, algebra and writing, part of BC’s core curriculum.
“They aim to hold those incarcerated students to the same standards and have the same levels of ambition and aspirations for those student’s futures as they do with students on campus,” said Kenner.
To be eligible for the program, potential students are required to hold a high school degree. Applicants are given a written exam and selected individuals undergo an interview portion. For BC’s first cohort, 16 men were selected out of nearly 100 applicants.
Though only a few months into the semester, BCPEP program director Isabel Lane said a community has been built within the classroom.
