Monday, April 6, 2020

College Behind Bars (episode 1)

So by now everyone has watched the first episode of College Behind Bars on Netflix. I'm sure we are going to talk about it on Tuesday during our video chat, but I wanted to get a head start on the blog. I want to know what y'all thought about it. I really enjoyed watching it and seeing these men and women who are incarcerated for many years but still have hope and drive to get a degree. One of the men in the episode said he was incarcerated at the age of 17 and he was now going into his 22nd year in prison. He kept hope and wanted to get his life together. I also found it very interesting how the school itself handled being a "prison school." One of the teachers explained that they didn't care where they were, they were going to teach normal college level classes to the students (no matter who the students are or what they did to get to prison). It even said most of the teachers have no idea how long the students have been in prison or why they are there in the first place. So, those are my initial thoughts. Did y'all enjoy it? What did y'all think overall? 

2 comments:

Unknown said...

I found the documentary to be very intriguing. I actually watched all the episodes over the weekend. Frankly, this shows just how dumb America can be. This country knew for years that education in prison reduced recidivism, but we cut all of those programs just to save a buck. Even though a number of studies have shown these programs to be incredibly effective, our government continues to do nothing. I would encourage you to watch the rest of the series. It is very interesting to watch these individuals in prison develop into real scholars. I think that they are more committed to their studies than many students are in their undergraduate degree programs.

Unknown said...

I really enjoyed the documentary. Going in, I didn't have any interest in it because I wondered why free education should be given to criminals. Just a few minutes into the first episode I came to realize the truth behind education behind bars. I'm really happy I watched it because it gave me insight on the reality of these people and the importance of education for everyone. To speak further on this, it is completely unnecessary for college in the states to be as outrageously expensive as it is, and that fact that community colleges are looked down upon.