Key Takeaways:
- The concept of time is complex and multifaceted, with different perspectives on its nature and significance.
- Prisoners face significant challenges in accessing higher education, with limited opportunities and resources available.
- Education is a powerful tool for personal growth, rehabilitation, and empowerment, but it is often hindered by prison policies and lack of support.
- Despite these challenges, many prisoners are determined to pursue education and create a better future for themselves.
- The availability of accredited college programs in prisons is crucial for reducing recidivism and promoting successful reentry into society.
Introduction to the Concept of Time
As someone who has been sentenced to a lifetime behind bars, time is both abstract and defined. When you have so much time, it is all you have, yet, inside, you have almost no control over how to spend it. Every day, I can hear it: tick, tick, tick. It’s torturous, like that dripping faucet in my cell. So to quiet the sound, I study. I learn. I try to build something meaningful from the minutes. The concept of time is complex and multifaceted, with different perspectives on its nature and significance. Some define time as linear, while others see it as a block, something spent, in the present, or the future.
The Challenges of Prison Life
Prison life is an insidious thing. The environment is conducive to vice and illicit activities. Drugs and gambling are easy to find; doing something constructive, like education, well, that can be a monumental task. The NJSP’s education department only offers GED-level (high-school level) education. Prisoners can also enrol in outside correspondence courses, also known as independent study. These include certifications, like in paralegal studies, costing about $750 to $1,000. However, the options for college degrees from reputable accredited universities can run into the thousands – a non-starter for most of those imprisoned.
The Importance of Education
Education is a powerful tool for personal growth, rehabilitation, and empowerment. It equips us to better handle stressful situations and nurture creativity and artistic expression. Thomas Koskovich, a 47-year-old prisoner, sees education as key to self-betterment. He believes that education can help prisoners develop skills that will allow them to earn a living legally and contribute to society in a positive way. Kashif Hassan, another prisoner, has earned multiple degrees, including two PhDs, through university distance education. He believes that education is the difference between feeling powerless and feeling empowered.
The Struggle for Access to Education
Despite the importance of education, many prisoners face significant challenges in accessing it. The Department of Corrections may store bodies, but it does not nurture minds. Limited access to education in prisons remains a major barrier to rehabilitation and reentry into society. Decades of studies support the idea that education in prison reduces recidivism – a RAND meta-analysis found a 43 percent lower likelihood of reoffending among inmates who pursued studies. However, the cancellation of the college correspondence roster and the banning of used books have made it even harder for prisoners to access education.
A Glimmer of Hope
In 2023, I learned of a glimmer of progress. The Thomas Edison State University (TESU) in Trenton launched a new programme enabling men in NJSP to pursue accredited college degrees. In 2024, I began taking TESU courses for a liberal arts degree. My tuition is paid for by grants and scholarships. The programme runs independently from the NJSP’s education department, which only proctors exams. For those of us long shut out of higher learning, it felt revolutionary. As if a door opened where there had only been a wall. It has made me feel free and given me purpose.
Conclusion
In the end, freedom does not begin with release. It begins with the decision to grow. It begins with the mind. Education here is not charity. It is resistance. It is the one realm where we can still choose, and in choosing, we stay human and free. Because in this place, where time is both enemy and companion, every page turned, every lesson learned, is a way to quiet the endless ticking, a way to remind ourselves that even behind bars, time can still belong to us. Tick. Tick. Tick. The story of prisoners taking on the US justice system through law, prison hustles, and hard-won education is a testament to the human spirit’s ability to persevere and thrive in the face of adversity.