The traditional undergraduate graduation took place on a sunny day at the Mann Center in May. Three months later, on a dreary Wednesday afternoon in Chester, another group of Eastern students graduated with their associates degrees inside the walls of a prison. The ceremony’s’ mood did not match the weather or the intimidating barbed-wired exterior, with smiles, handshakes and standing ovations as graduates walked across the stage. From graduating another cohort to naming a new director, the Prison Education Program (PEP) is experiencing positive growth.
PEP is a two year cohort program operating out of SCI Chester through Eastern University, which “…aims to provide transformative education for our neighbors who are incarcerated and returning from incarceration.” PEP is the outgrowth of Dr. Kimberlee Johnson’s sabbatical year in 2014-2015 wherein she researched ways Christian higher education institutions could address the problem of mass incarceration. Students must apply and be accepted into the program and can earn an Associate of Arts degree while still incarcerated. Two cohorts have graduated from the program since its inception in 2015, although the program did not receive the ability of pell grant funding until 2020. Currently, a third cohort is already underway.
Tara Ronda is the newest addition to the PEP as the program director. She follows in the footsteps of Dr. Kimberlee Johnson, Dr. John Fantuzzo and Cara Blouin, and brings an expertise of her own. “I’ve worked in prison education for about 12 years, and it’s a relatively small community, especially locally. I knew about Eastern because it’s not that far from where I live in South Jersey, and I was thinking about applying to teach as an adjunct with PEP. I’d been looking for an opportunity to change jobs for the last year or two… I saw the PEP ad pop up one day and it seemed perfect, so I applied,” Ronda said.
The impact PEP is having on incarcerated students and their families is enormous. “At this point, I’ve met just about all the students who have been in an Eastern cohort at SCI Chester, and a common theme comes up in a lot of my conversations with them: The education we’re offering them is a genuine game-changer. Even if they don’t finish the degree, they get something valuable just by sitting in the classroom, having academic discussions with peers, learning to write effective essays…all of it. They’re building their self-efficacy and finding a new role for themselves in society. Guys with children are excited to let their kids know how school is going for them – it’s opened up new lines of communication and, as they see it, giving their families a reason to be proud of them. I think it’s mostly about the hope they have for a better life when they get out, and for the few students who aren’t getting out, it gives them a reason to get up in the morning,” Ronda said.
As the newest director of PEP, Ronda has high hopes the program will continue to offer the best possible educational opportunities to students. She says there is a strong foundation laid down already from which to continue to grow the program. “The collaborative relationship between PEP folks and the staff at SCI Chester is remarkable, and while it’s not perfect, there’s definitely something strong there on which to build. I would also love to create a more robust extra-/co-curricular program to give our incarcerated students an even more authentic college experience, though obviously we’re limited in the ways we can do that. At the end of the day, I want students to know they’re students, not felons, inmates, criminals, etc,” Ronda said.
For students looking to get involved with PEP, there are many opportunities to get inside the prison and begin to build bridges between St. Davids and SCI Chester. The first is tutoring through the Petey Greene program. The Petey Greene Program (PGP) trains individuals to provide tutoring services inside prisons to incarcerated students, and can be done as an internship. According to Ronda, students can expect representatives for the PGP to be stopping by campus soon to advertise the program.
Several Eastern professors teach through PEP and look for student TA’s each semester. Currently, Dr. Lo of the Psychology department is looking for a undergraduate student to TA for a General Psychology class once a week in Chester. Interested students should email her at lbanfiel@eastern.edu. Traditional undergraduate students can earn credit through “Inside-Out” classes, taken at the SCI Chester campus alongside incarcerated students. These classes meet once a week and require access to personal transportation. Students can find these classes in the course catalogue through filtering by location and selecting “SCI Chester.” Additionally, Ronda reports PEP has an open federal work-study position. Interested students can apply on Handshake.