Education and Rehab

Prisoner education must focus on rehabilitation
by Pat Jones

The author of the article talks about the importance of education in prisoner’s rehab process, because of its possibility of cutting recidivism. She is criticizing an article written by the education minister, which doesn’t really understand the implications of the process, and the need to give prisoner’s education a fundamental place. An example of that is the resource’s cut that is forcing to reduce the quality of prison education, cutting jobs and classes, because she thinks that a really good way of saving money and improving the society is giving the prisoners a good chance of reintegrating society. Also, she thinks this education has to be more than just teaching basic skills, it has to open the prisoner real employ options, and make him or her to choose and develop the skills that they want to, guide by their vocational paths. This opportunity to find a new direction for their life, is a real and sure option to rehab, so, the acquisition of basic skills is good, but it’s only a beginning.
The minister’s article also shows a typical prejudice of prisoners, saying that their education level is always low, and their intelligence, limited. In the reality, says the author, a lot of the prisoners didn’t have a good education level, but they make rapid progress and show themselves really interested on learning, in fact, there are many stories about prisoners who have make significant progress, in some cases on acquiring just low-level knowledge or basic skills, and in others with complex and difficult skills or knowledge, like professional degrees.
The big problem is that the government is trying to improve the results without being willing of spending more money on it, without considering how much many prisoners want to change and find a new direction for their life.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2010/oct/05/prison-education-focus-rehabilitation