Something Extraordinary Is Happening at Ironwood State Prison

I know a good movie when I see one, but recently I had a day that was more fascinating, inspiring and compelling than the greatest of films. And every minute of it was real.

Picture driving on a desolate two-lane road, past one low flat building after another, before seeing the tall steel fences and razor wire that signal your destination: a maximum security prison, blazing hot, in the middle of the desert, not far from the border between California and Arizona, an hour past the sunny vacation destination of Palm Springs. After several checks of your identification and passing through multiple sets of sliding steel gates, you're directed down a long sidewalk with an empty yard on one side and concrete buildings on the other. It's eerily quiet, though you know 3,280 men live here in a space built for 2,200.

But inside these concrete buildings, something extraordinary is happening. The largest prison education program in California is thriving at Ironwood State Prison, where men are transcribing college textbooks into Braille, learning trade skills and where an astonishing 1200+ students have earned college degrees.

Most of the men at Ironwood are in for hard time -- though not necessarily for hard crime. Many are affected by California's three-strikes law under which even low-level felonies, such as writing a bad check, can garner a strike on the way to serving 25-to-life sentences. Men, even young men, rattled off how long they had been in: 19 years, 25 years, 33 years. And they weren't even close to getting out.

Somehow, some way, these men are building hope, developing compassion and coming to terms with what they've done. In some cases, they are coming to terms with the fact that their actions mean they may never step outside these walls again. They may die at Ironwood. And yet they are finding ways to be productive.

Ironwood has also become a beacon of hope for 18-year-olds sentenced to adult prison for the first time. Here they become students and enter the college program mentored by the "lifers," who have learned their lessons the hard way and don't want this next generation to follow in their footsteps. These young students are able to avoid the typical prison experience of drugs, violence and negativity because Ironwood has created a culture, a new normal, centered around education, transformation and personal responsibility. And this culture change has manifested itself in a new sense of pride by both students and staff.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/scott-budnick/something-extraordinary-i_b_5438191.html

Good. Let's hope it works.

eddie wrote:Good. Let's hope it works.

Our prison system is not funded for such as this, a great shame really

This is fantastic and a sign that the U.S. is moving away from the misguided "tough on crime" politics that dominated in the '80s and '90s, where politicians campaigned on either passing tougher and harsher sentencing laws or on the sentencing laws they'd enacted. Of course, what they ended up doing was writing off literally millions of lives, but nobody cared because they were "criminals" on paper, even if in reality they were very young people who had made a mistake, like most young people do.

I think its brilliant but life in prison for the three strikes seems harsh and if they are rehabilitated what point is there keeping them locked ?

Young people do stupid things and are not what you call dangerous but America are locking them away for 25+ years ?

Vicar of Dibley wrote:I think its brilliant but life in prison for the three strikes seems harsh and if they are rehabilitated what point is there keeping them locked ?

Young people do stupid things and are not what you call dangerous but America are locking them away for 25+ years ?

You're spot on, and that's why the U.S. has the largest incarcerated population in all the world and why private companies have pushed into the prison industry, making the whole situation worse with their cost-cutting.

The public is uninformed -- most Americans hear that more criminals are being locked up than ever before, for longer sentences than ever before, and a vast segment of the public says, "Good! Serves those scumbags right!"

What they don't know, or care to know, is that a lot of those scumbags were caught with an ounce of weed in their car or committed some other non-violent offense.

What this has also led to, according to my brother the probation officer, is that the prisons are so overcrowded that they now routinely give probation to people who were found guilty of crimes as severe as 'conspiracy to commit murder.' Those people should be in prison, but there's no room for them, so they're sent back onto the streets with "reporting duties."

Another guy he told me about was found guilty of committing arson -- but out on parole, the prison system has too many potheads in it ...

Ben_Reilly wrote:Another guy he told me about was found guilty of committing arson -- but out on parole, the prison system has too many potheads in it ...

The real criminals should be behind bars but clear out the petty criminals and give them some rehab skills so they can become decent members of society . It does work and it is the right thing , everyone deserves a chance to improve .