These words are reaching you through the love and compassion of another human being. It’s done via a paid service, to the help of someone who believes I matter. Trust when I say that every word you read here is at the grace of someone else…
What does it take for someone in prison to become educated to free world standards? A lot of determination and resources not available in prison. So, let me explain a bit what I’m talking about… If a guy wants to study up on case law to try and defend a point from prison, he visits the law library in that prison. There are computers with only digital law books. With a pad of paper and a pencil and he scratches out his motion based on notes he finds in the digital books. But the law library isn’t some charitable thing. There’s no “giving” the resources of legal access… No, that had to be legislated in. A law was made to allow a man to defend himself from prison. But the law stops at the research of case law. You wanna file that motion? Sharpen your crayons and get your lined paper ready, because that’s the hot mess that goes to the courts. Got bad penmanship? Your brief might he tossed entirely. While anyone in the free world has things like Microsoft Word to construct anything professional, inmates get laughed out of court. So what does this have to do with education?
If that same inmate wants to be academically engaged, the work it takes to be done digitally has do be done with the help of a free person. What about the guy with no support system? Good luck on writing that paper in the format required… Recently, a friend was given the criteria to submit an academic paper for journal publishing. The criteria was completely unobtainable without the support of the free world. This friend is gifted and knowledgeable on the subject to a perfect degree, yet they are the voice that was to be stifled. Who better to speak to the impact of effective healthcare as posed by the Journal for Correctional Health Care, than a person with a deep history of needing that healthcare and a mind to articulate it? And the criteria had requested someone with an incarcerated background… but only if you have a laptop, email, and the means to do all that the free world does. But we don’t. And for this journal to ask for an honest perspective, you would think that getting it from someone who lives it would be acceptable, even if it was scratched out in crayon on lined paper.
Inmates are largely restricted by the technology that it takes to improve their lives. It’s not just legal work or academic work. There’s no way to submit effective resumes prior to release. There’s no way to digitally organize a release plan for parole officer review prior to release. There’s no way to research housing for a safe stay prior to release. We live in a cave. The only reason we have a computer with law books is because someone had to make it a law. Make it a law to mirror the free world so those incarcerated have the skills and knowledge it takes to not be a drain on society. But, I guess if that happened, someone would be out of a job and some publisher of a journal about inmates couldn’t feel like a fucking elitist…
by Rory Andes
When we make things happen, know that it takes years of determination…
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Rory Andes 367649
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Monroe, WA 98272