Prisoners.  The Incarcerated. People in the hoosgow, the crowbar hotel, the Big House.  Where cons go to shiv one another and not drop things in the shower. I’ve never had anything to do with the detention system, but oddly, interesting tidbits about Prison Life cross my path.  I was doing an instructional design project a few years ago, and one of the teachers in the group shared a story of having worked as a Distance Learning teacher and realizing she was evaluating the writing of a convicted serial killer. It made me think differently about who my learners might be.

Some years later, I found myself in a face to face class with adult learners teaching a class on Learning Theory for the first time.  These learners were from a wide variety of situations and organizations, and topic of Prisoners came up.  It’s not what you might be thinking, however… click here to read the whole story.

Today, a couple of my Nerdlings are heading down to the penitentiary to install some computers for an inmate classroom.  It’s been interesting to listen to the conversations as the equipment and protocols are being prepared and established. For example, all of the equipment needs a high level of security– that it can’t be “hacked”, used to access the Internet, enable messaging, storage or import of content. But, we need to give the learners meaningful activities and opportunities to learn.  The whole idea of school in prison is to teach skills with a view to improving communication and employment skills. Also, to provide a positive education experience–something that may well not have been the experience of Those On the Inside.

The next adventure of the Tech Department…