News

By Jon Marc Taylor, Ph.D.

“New York’s success against crime over the past two decades,” observes Franklin Zimring, the author of The City that Became Safe: New York’s lessons for Urban Crime and Its Control, “has proved the wrong headedness of the ^‘incapacitation or nothing’ strategy.”

Second:  The next stage of reform needs to be action that substantially reduces correctional costs.   A recent U.S. Senate survey of  prison  wardens  from  across  the  country  revealed    that  half of their charges could  be released  tomorrow without  jeopardizing public safety.

I had an older non-reader who ran circles around the other guys when it came to history. I would show a video about a war. He knew what was coming before it came on the screen, and he was very proud of himself. The other men respected him for that, and it gave him a chance to shine.

One of the movies I have shown occasionally is Titanic. I would have thought by now everybody has seen Titanic. But as I tell my students, a lot of them have “lived under rocks.” They don’t go to movies unless it is a “guy” movie, a big adventure film with high action. I spend a lot of time explaining to them they need to expand their horizons. Most eventually learn whenever I show a movie, they all love it and know I am not going to give them something that will put them to sleep.

By Jon Marc Taylor

IS THIS THE PERPETUAL END GAME

The results of this mulish criminal justice social-engineering policy is the present circumstance  of  public higher  education in the Show-Me State. In 1977, the legislature provided 47 percent of the University of Missouri – Kansas City’s (UMKC) operating revenue. This year — before the proposed further 12.5 percent cut — a mere 15 percent of its budget is state subsidized. In just the past three years, factoring in the governor^’s proposed slashing budget cuts, the per-student appropriation at UHKC will have dropped from $9000 to $5700.    As a consequence, the Kansas City Star, with matter of fact reporting, observed that “students and their families will have to shoulder [an ever] larger part of university revenue through tuition checks.”

By Jon Marc Taylor

Not only does Missouri proportionally lock up more of its residents than Illinois or Kansas, it does so for far longer terms as well than in any of the surrounding states. Missouri judges routinely sentence offenders to prison in excess of the national norms, to the point that Show-He State prisoners serve sentences approaching two-thirds longer than the national average.

Approaching two decades ago, the Missouri Legislature, in a pique of political pandering of “get tough on crime” rhetoric, enacted poorly thought out Truth-In-Sentencing statutes, mandating violent offenders serve a minimum of 85 percent of their sentences before becoming parole eligible. Since then myopic legislators have more than doubled the number of offenses receiving mandatory 85 percent terms by extending the sentencing laws to various offenses, and now to some white collar crimes as well.

Scenarios are an excellent way to help students learn skills and apply them to everyday life. Especially in our vocational program, we use scenarios quite often. Horticulture is learned in a greenhouse environment. Those students also care for the lawn and gardens surrounding the school. Small electronics are learned by working on broken microwave ovens, televisions and radios. The electronics teacher has a collaborative project with Goodwill Industries.  The Goodwill truck delivers broken donations to the prison; the students learn as they repair the toasters, VCR’s, radios and, blenders.  Goodwill then is able to sell the repaired items rather than throw them away. Culinary arts students prepare luncheons.  The automotive students repair and service staff members’ cars.  The students in Construction Trades assist with repairs throughout the institution, build custom furniture, and work on projects for Habitat for Humanity.

By Jon Marc Taylor

“For years and years,” observes Robin Cook, an MU senior and student activist, who lobbied the State General Assembly in 2003 not to further cut the university budget, “the legislature has decided  that higher  education  is essentially the  whipping boy for state government,”    For Robin and  tens of  thousands of other students, between 2002 and 2004, the rate of tuition at the University of Missouri – Columbia rose 28 percent.”

In our prison, all disabled and special needs students are mainstreamed into the classroom. Individual education plan conferences and case reviews tend to be sporadic, and sometimes don’t happen because of the age factor. Legally, if they are over twenty-three, we don’t have to provide the special services we must offer the younger individuals. If they are under twenty-three, by law we have to provide all of these meetings.

Generally, it is up to the individual teacher to accommodate each student. The best way to explain this is to give a personal example.

In April 2006, I received a request from a gentleman who was 100% blind, to be enrolled in school. The immediate reaction was a bit of fear by anybody I approached with the request. No one, including my supervisor, thought we could accommodate the man’s situation. I thought, though, we had a legal and ethical obligation to offer him services.

By Latin Cooke

Billionaire Warren Buffett and his big sister Doris Buffett understand the keys to success are through teaching, giving, and having a good education. Inmates across the United States, ranging from places like Sing Sing in New York to other institutions like Washington State Penitentiary in Walla Walla, Washington are benefiting from their generosity. The Buffetts fund over 20 educational, rehabilitative and re-entry programs across the United States. The main focuses of these are on reducing recidivism and reintegrating participants back into normal society.

By Jon Marc Taylor

WHAT PRISONS COST MISSOURI

The cost to Missouri students and their parents has been and remains direct and immediately punitive. The end result is that ever- fewer educationally qualified students, primarily from the poor and working class strata, the majority minorities, many of whom would have been the first in their families to go to college, are progressively being squeezed out of higher educational opportunities. As already mentioned, the University of Missouri is now the most expensive public college in the Big 12 Conference, and many of the university system’s professional programs, such as dentistry, medicine and optometry, are among the most expensive state supported schools in the country.

It takes a lot of work, but once lesson plans and assessments are developed, I merely hang on to them. As I have mentioned, I can use them at other times, because six or eight months later, I have almost entirely new students.

I have no choice but to honor diversity and to individualize instruction. It is an understatement to say I have vast diversity in my classroom. I teach twelve months out of the year, but the students flow in and out on a weekly basis. Several students leave, and several enter each month. There are set standards of what needs to be mastered, but each student is on an individual plan and on an individual schedule.