NCJ Number
141283
Journal
Corrections Today Volume: 55 Issue: 1 Dated: (February 1993) Pages: 78-80
Date Published
1993
Length
3 pages
Annotation
The "Books Behind Bars" program at the Luther Luckett Correctional Complex in LaGrange, Ky., is an innovative program that brings together inmates, high-risk middle school students, and volunteer college students to discuss novels.
Abstract
The 15-month-old program allows individuals from various backgrounds to learn from each other as they share in the education experience. Specific program objectives are to instill a love for reading in inmates and youth, nurture in participants the desire to help others and take an active role in solving social problems, encourage participants to relate the universal themes about the human condition presented in classic literature to contemporary society and its problems, to instill in participants the general value of education, and to overcome the negative effects of isolation by exposing inmates to youths' ideas and problems. Prison staff oversee the program's administration and are responsible for providing security to the middle school and college students who participate. Most participating inmates are enrolled in an academic program at the institution; however, a few with limited or no literacy skills have participated by listening to the books on tape or having other inmates read the books to them. With the recent expansion of the program to include more schools and a women's correctional institution, program staff are confident it will become a permanent part of Kentucky's correctional programming.