Category: News

Book Donations to OSP Special Housing

Posted on by kdwyer6

Since 2021, PEP has been working with Special Housing Units through LEAP packets (Learning, Engagement, and Activities Packets).  The packets include essays, short stories, poems, activities, and artwork. They also include writing prompts throughout the packet, inviting readers to respond to the parts that interest them. Our LEAP coordinator will give feedback to everyone who writes responses to the packet.

To learn more about LEAP, click here.

Through this project, we were asked by staff to contribute books directly to the small library in the Special Housing Unit. We are glad to send in things that will be intellectually interesting and spark conversation for folks there, and hope you will consider donating frequently requested books.

If you are interested in donating books, we have an Amazon wish list of books that have been requested or are of particular interest inside.

Feel free to share our wishlist widely!

Now accepting artwork for the 2023 PEP art show!

Posted on by kdwyer6

Continuing what is now an annual tradition, we are preparing for the 2023 art show at the University of Oregon’s EMU, featuring currently incarcerated artists. We will have art to share soon! For now, here is our invitation to artists to participate.

Call for art!

The University of Oregon’s Prison Education Program (PEP) is holding an annual exhibition of artwork by artists from OSP, OSCI and CCCF from February 6 – March 9, 2023 in the Erb Memorial Union (EMU) student union building on the UO campus. The EMU is a bustling building which thousands of people pass through each week.

The PEP seeks donations of artwork to display on campus. We hope to auction off the art pieces after the show ends and invest any proceeds from the sale of art into education programs at Oregon prisons. Artwork cannot be returned—this is a permanent donation to the PEP—and any proceeds will go to the PEP and not to artists. For anyone willing to contribute art pieces, we are enormously grateful and hope that your contribution will help raise awareness of the diverse talents of incarcerated people in Oregon. You will help us as we continue to work to provide educational opportunities inside.

Works may relate to the theme “A Sense of Place”—a common thread across this year’s Prison Education Program (PEP) courses—or follow any inspiration of your choosing.

You will receive written feedback as a participating artist about your works featured in the exhibition from UO faculty, students and community members. You will also receive a printed catalog documenting works in the show and gallery space after the exhibition closes. A closing reception will be held on the UO campus on Thursday, March 9, 2023.

Be on the lookout for new Art Show news in early 2023!

Second page of the flyer, with Feedback from the 2022 Art Show. "I absolutely loved the art, but what I especially enjoyed was the artists' comments and explanation about their pieces. It made the work so much more meaningful. This show reminded me of the humanity of everyone no matter where they are."

Announcing Winter Inside-Out Classes

Posted on by kdwyer6
Back before the pandemic, we regularly had between two and four Inside-Out classes each term. It has been great to be back to it with our fall term class, and we are very excited to have two Inside-Out classes lined up for Winter 2023. They are “Existentialism in Literature and Philosophy” with Professor Jeffrey Librett and “The Story of Social Inequality: what ethnography, fiction and memoir tell us about how inequality is structured and experienced” with Professor Ellen Scott.

Ellen Scott has been teaching Inside-Out classes since 2011. Jeffrey Librett has had a long and celebrated teaching career at the University of Oregon, and this will be his first Inside-Out class!

We are looking forward to the term ahead!

Return to Inside-Out Courses

Posted on by kcarls10

After what feels like an eternity, we’re excited to announce that the UO Prison Education Program is facilitating another Inside-Out course this fall term! It’s been a long two years without getting inside and outside students together in the classroom. Now, we’ve got a class of 24 students in PHIL 407/HC 421: Mercy and the Rule of Law, taught by Professor Kristen Bell. Everyone is motivated and excited to be back in person, and this is visible in the enthusiasm brought from both inside and outside. We wish students continued success in their studies!

Abridged Interview with Steve Durrant

Posted on by kcarls10

At the request of one of our inside students, we’ve started asking program staff and instructors why they work with PEP. We’ll be including responses on our website and in our newsletters, so keep an eye out!

Professor Steve Durrant, a professor of Chinese literature who’s been teaching with PEP for several years, shared a little about what motivates him to be involved in the program:

 

“When I think of the world around us, I think of the geographical space that reaches out to other cultures, but I also think of temporal space and history. I’m trying to give the men inside an experience of the world that is both physically–and in most cases, temporally–quite far removed and constrained. There’s that cultural dimension to it.

I also really believe in the transformative power of literature, the way literature challenges us and makes us think of subjects that might not otherwise come up. I believe in the power of literature to make a difference in these men’s lives–and from my experience, it does.

The students are fully alive in so many ways. I learn from them, they give me insight into ways to think about these texts that I haven’t thought about myself. It’s a reciprocal relationship. I get to teach something I like, and it’s always a joy when people respond to that teaching.

Students have mentioned how relevant so many subjects of the Chinese literature courses are to them as incarcerated men. You see that we are all human beings. The men are always able to emotionally and intellectually cross over that seeming gap, the space between where they are and the texts that they’re reading, to identify with and be moved by the things that we’ve been and the material we’ve looked at.”

Celebrating One Year of LEAP!

Posted on by kcarls10
In July of 2021, the Prison Education Program sent its first Learning Engagement and Activities Packets (LEAP) to OSP. LEAP is for folks in special housing units, and the idea for the project originally came from leaders on the inside. Readers can reflect on a range of open-ended prompts that encourage creative thinking and expression. PEP receives and responds to the variety of insightful ideas that people share in writing and art. With packets having now gone to hundreds of people at OSP, we’ve been blown away by the level of engagement and thoughtfulness.

Book Donations

Posted on by kcarls10

The UO Prison Education Program collects books year-round to donate to correctional facilities’ libraries. Popular topics include money management, nonfiction, and books of any genre in Spanish. The program will announce book drives and more donation opportunities throughout the school year. If you would like to donate one or more books, or are otherwise curious about being involved in our program, please email uoprisoned@uoregon.edu or contact us here through our website.

Summer Courses

Posted on by kcarls10

Though COVID paused face-to-face classes, the Prison Education Program has provided packet-format courses to inside students at Oregon State Penitentiary, Oregon State Correctional Institution, Coffee Creek Correctional Facility, and Deer Ridge Correctional Institution. Enrollment for the summer term was 98 students, between six classes (listed below). Moreover, we are thrilled to announce the graduation of two students at the end of summer term, both of whom are receiving undergraduate degrees in General Social Sciences!

 

The courses offered during summer term are:

Geography 468/510: Geography of Food Systems, Professor Leslie McLees

Geography 410/510: Landscapes of Climate Change, Professor Leslie McLees

Geography 410/510: Global Change, with Professor Scott Warren

College of Arts & Sciences 407/507: Conflict Resolution, Professor Katie Dwyer

Math 107: University Math III, Professor Craig Tingey

Political Science 405/505: Democracy and Power in Contemporary American Politics, Professor Gerald Berk

Classes with two course numbers are offered at both undergraduate and graduate levels. More information on packet courses and inside-out classes can be found on our website.

Prison Education Program (PEP) Internship – Application due Sunday, May 29th

Posted on by ekalbro3

The Prison Education Program is recruiting student interns for the 2022 – 2023 academic year. Our interns help us with all elements of our program, providing support for in-person classes inside the prisons, distance learning, in-person events, communication, research, logistics support, etc.

 

Our program was enormously impacted by Covid – we paused all in-person activities in March of 2020, and were only able to restart on an extremely limited scale in March 2022. In spite of this, our program continued to offer classes, run book donation drives, participate in statewide organizing for higher education, advise inside students, and pursue other goals in support of both on-campus and incarcerated students. Usually our interns would be recruited from students who have taken Inside-Out classes and therefore have experiences in the prisons. However, we have few–if any–students who have had those experiences due to the pandemic. We therefore are seeking students who are passionate about this kind of work, will be flexible in a changing work environment, have the emotional maturity to work in difficult spaces, work as a team but also be able to do independent projects, and are able to abide by a range of rules that make our work possible.

 

We are looking for students who have leadership experience or who have a capacity to step into new leadership roles. Experience with a project similar to our program is helpful but not required.

 

Position Description 

Interns with the Prison Education Program provide essential support to our projects. The range of tasks varies widely. General areas include:

 

  • Administrative (preparing readings and other materials, data entry, preparing class folders)
  • Communication (website, LinkedIn, newsletters to distribute to email list and in print inside the prisons)
  • Project support (assisting a faculty member with a particular program, requiring a broad range of skills)
  • Classroom support (transportation logistics, student communication, support in in-class activities, etc)

 

Time requirements vary depending on current projects and prison schedules. However, we ask students to plan to commit to at least 3 hours per week of pre-scheduled meetings and/or work sessions, and at least another 3 of independent work. If we are able to hold in-person programs again, programs in the prisons will be in addition to this.

 

You will work most closely with Katie Dwyer, the Program Coordinator, who will help supervise and direct the intern group. The 2022-2023 intern cohort will be 4 or 5 individuals. You will also work with other PEP faculty, formerly incarcerated leaders, and other members of the campus and broader community.

 

Stipend 

We are able to offer interns a $500 stipend per term in partial recognition of their work.


Interns must be current UO students. Unfortunately, we cannot work with graduate students with GE positions. 

 

Apply using this google form by 11:59pm on Sunday, May 29th. 

 

Questions can be sent to Katie Dwyer, the Program Coordinator, at kdwyer6@uoregon.edu

Celebrating 15 Years of Inside-Out at University of Oregon

Posted on by ekalbro3

On May 5th, over 40 members of the Prison Education Program community gathered together in person at the Ford Alumni Center to celebrate 15 years since the first Inside-Out class at University of Oregon .

We heard heartfelt memories from alumni (both formerly on-campus students and formerly incarcerated), faculty and supporters. Everyone in attendance participated in a modified “wagon wheel” (a staple in Inside-Out classes).

It was a beautiful evening celebrating the success and growth of UO’s Prison Education Program over the past 15 years.

We would like to thank University of Oregon’s Alumni Association for all their work putting this event together!