IU Class Teaching Prisoners And Undergrads Won’t Continue
An IU class offered to undergraduate students and prison inmates will not continue after this semester. (photo credit: Barbara Brosher/WTIU News)
A public speaking class at Indiana University-Bloomington that enrolled undergraduate students and prisoners at the Monroe County jail will not continue after this semester.
The class is part of a national program, called Inside Out, which trains university instructors to work in prisons and jails. The class can be in any discipline as long as a main focus of the class is a social justice issue in the local community.
The Inside Out classes at IU were public speaking and Deliberative Democracy, a class focused on politics and community organizing. Lindsey Badger, a Ph.D candidate in the Department of Communication and Culture, taught these classes after being trained by the national Inside Out team. She says her students have looked at social issues in Bloomington including police practices and fair housing practices for people with criminal records. The students choose a big issue and try to find a tangible way to address the issue.
“We stage public meetings, we have students go to city and county council, we have them put together packets to distribute to local non-profits,” Badger says. “They hold community meetings both in the jail and out in the communities that are topical.”
Because Badger is a graduate student, the College of Arts and Sciences can only fund her teaching this class for up to four years, which is why this specific section of public speaking won’t be offered after the current semester.
But College of Arts and Sciences spokesperson Deborah Galyan says it doesn’t have to end long term. Another graduate student who completes the Inside Out training could apply for funding.
“It can’t be taught by just any graduate student associate instructor, and at the moment, there are no graduate students who have proposed to teach this course or a similar course,” Galyan says. “The College would certainly take such a course proposal under consideration, just as it would other proposals from its graduate student associate instructors.”
Inside Out founder and Temple University criminal justice professor Lori Pompa says continuing this class helps an entire community. She says the students living outside jail gain a new perspective on their community, but the students in the jail often gain confidence. She says many had a negative experience with school, and this class helps change that perspective on education.
“So what they have is this incredible educational experience through the Inside Out program and it enlivens people,” Pompa says. “It gets people in touch with how smart they are, how capable they are how creative they can be.”
Editor’s Note: Although the program at Indiana University in Bloomington is expected to end this semester, ongoing Inside-Out programs are taught by regular full-time faculty members at at least 7 other Indiana universities.