Project Narrative: The Lessons Learned from Implementing the Prison Education Project

ABSTRACT: This article examines the hard lessons learned from the author’s development of the Prison Education Project (PEP). PEP has expanded educational opportunities for inmates in 11 California correctional facilities. With the assistance of 600 university student and faculty volunteers, PEP has serviced approximately 4,000 inmates in these facilities since 2011. By providing academic, life skills, and career development programing, PEP aims to educate, empower, and transform the lives of incarcerated individuals. This reflective essay is more about the lessons learned from founding and directing PEP than it is about the program activities of the organization. The robust spirit of volunteerism is a central component of the discussion in this article and the “Reciprocal Reflex” is at the heart of the PEP volunteer experience. This phenomenon ignites the passion and gratitude of both the volunteers and inmates. The volunteers learn just as much as they teach and the inmates teach just as much as they learn. The discussion of the implementation challenges should give the reader an understanding of what it takes to create and sustain a nonprofit organization that helps inspire and empower those entangled in the criminal justice system. It concisely summarizes the “big picture” lessons learned from implementing the largest volunteer-based prison education program of its kind in the United States.