Education in prison

In this episode, we explore how education transforms lives within Canada's federal correctional institutions. We’ll hear a teacher talk about his work, and we'll also hear from one of his students who reflects on the positive impacts education had on his life.

Discover how education helps with rehabilitation, but also contributes to safer communities and reduced recidivism.

What is Prisons Inside/Out?

Listen to Prisons Inside/Out, a podcast from Correctional Service Canada. Follow along as we take you beyond the walls of our institutions, highlighting the important work we do to protect Canadians and change lives every day.

Kirstan: Around 75% of people who enter federal prison don't have a high school diploma or equivalent. Behind the walls of correctional institutions, education is more than textbooks and classrooms — it's a powerful tool for transformation. In fact, education can significantly improve an offender's chances of successful reintegration into our society. Whether it's basic literacy, high school completion, or vocational training, these programs help offenders build the skills and confidence they need to change their lives.
Kirstan: In today's episode of Prisons Inside / Out, we speak with a teacher about his work and the influence he has had on incarcerated individuals. We also speak with one of his students who reflects on the positive impacts education has had on his life. I'm your host, Kirstan Gagnon. Welcome to another episode of Prisons Inside / Out.
Kirstan: I had the chance to speak with James, a teacher at Atlantic Institution, a maximum-security facility for men. James talks about his work and how he motivates inmates to take part in education programs.
Kirstan: James, welcome and thanks for joining us on the podcast today. Tell me a bit about yourself.
James: I started teaching about 17 years ago now, which every time I say it out loud it feels weird, and obviously it's more and more every time. Other than that, I've taught in the public school, then I moved on to college. I started teaching in Correctional Service Canada (CSC) about 15 years ago. I thought I was going to do it for one year and it's turned in the 15, so.
Kirstan: So why did you stay?
James: Not for a good reason. Me and my partner that she works here, partner as in I work with her, we both say we didn't choose to come, but then we decided to stay. So that's more important than anything. My best friend actually passed away when I was teaching in Moncton and then it was just, take a year off and see how it went and never went back.
Kirstan: Great, so you like it.
James: I do like it; I love it here. Yeah.
Kirstan: And I know that we that we really want the inmates in our in our custody to learn and to attain a high school diploma during their incarceration. How does how do we approach that?
James: That's the goal. It's very much case-by-case. We never know what we're going to get, who we're going to get, what kind of background, what kind of education they have. I've had everything from learning to speak English to geniuses that have graduated at 16. So we have everything and everybody's taken a different way and we work with whatever we're given.
Kirstan: So how do you customize the learning approach then?
James: Usually speak to the person, find out what they want, what their goal is, kind of what the expectation is and what our expectation is and how we feel we can really help them and bring them to somewhere where when they get out, they have skills to actually succeed. And yeah, because a lot of times, most of the guys, I shouldn't say most, but depending on the age, some of them have just never had anyone. So, the fact that they have people there that are excited to teach them, excited to help them, that's enough alone for them to want to be in school.
So, like I said, my partner Kelsey, probably a month ago now, she had a guy that got his Parole Officer (PO) to call back in because he was so proud that he started college.
Kirstan: The parole officer.
James: The parole officer called in, the offender was so proud that he was able to go on and start college. He never thought he could do anything. Kelsey worked with him a lot and brought him from like grade 6 up to high school. And I've had guys called in and be proud to working at McDonald's, say “I've never had a real job in my life, I've always done illegal means to get everything” and said, “I got a job now, I got a phone bill, I got a car.”
Kirstan: Because of education.
James: Yeah
Kirstan: Great. So, at the Correctional Service of Canada, we can, you mentioned we can focus on basic adult education, languages, English or French, post-secondary requisites, which you just talked about a bit — a college or university, if that's a goal. Would you be able to do that while incarcerated?
James: Yes. So, again, it goes by whatever means they have. Sometimes we do have some funding for them that we've found with different groups that will help pay. But normally they would either have to fund themselves, but there's paper-based courses now for university that we get sent in. We have to sign up as their representative and then the guy gets the complete so they actually can do a whole degree in here.
Kirstan: Wow. So how do you facilitate that learning in a prison setting?
James: Again, everyone's different, so it depends on the person. We have, especially in this setting here, I've worked at three different prisons now and this one here is the one you have to be the most flexible.
Kirstan: Okay. Why, because it's maximum-security?
James: Yeah
Kirstan: Okay.
James: Offenders can't mix, smaller classes, kind of, and you never know what's gonna happen.
Kirstan: I knew that in the past when I've met with inmates, they were saying, “oh, you know, I don't, I don't have any transferable skills.” But even if they were involved in illicit activity, like there are some skills involved that could be transferable if you unpack that a bit. So how do you help them work through that and apply it to what they might encounter if they eventually get a release, like working in a store and needing to do basic math, that sort of thing?
James: Yeah, most of the guys don't ever have anyone that's ever believed in them or ever tried to help them, so that's where the one-on-one or having a person in front of them really connects with them. That's when they start looking at what skills they actually have and we have guys that, one guy makes moccasins, that's a skill he learned in prison. A couple of the guys I know that I've worked with have gone out, the guy that worked at McDonald's actually went on, now he has his own catering business. He enjoyed cooking so much that he went on and skills that he learned in prison, the cooking, the type of cooking he does, he brought on to the street and now that's what he does out there. So they all learn different things and hopefully it's in their interest, and then they get to go outside and use it.
Kirstan: And for our listeners, for someone who's incarcerated that can retool themselves, learn new skills, well, they're less likely to return to our custody, correct?
James: That’s we hope for.
Kirstan: Yeah, more able to get a job and out of trouble, right?
James: We never know, I've seen people with all the skills in the world that I would put money on would never be back and be back in record time. And then I've seen guys where I go, “I wish we could have done this, I wish we could have done this,” never see them again. And then when I check in on them, they're doing great. So, it's really, we never know. We never know what's going on in their lives really and what's going on personally. We try to build a bond, but at the same time it's very hard.
Kirstan: But you would still say that that education you were able to offer improves public safety.
James: For sure, yes, yeah. Because you want to, educating them is one thing, because you hope the education will give them some self-esteem and some skills like that. But just the base fact of they can get a better job, they can make money is a huge thing. A lot of guys try to go into, I push a lot of guys into the trades, even some of the ones who maybe don't have a lot of skills that they can think of, go into the trades, get into construction, things like that and do well that way.
Kirstan: And what are some of the areas of interest that you see among the inmates here in maximum?
James: A lot of them want to do counseling, honestly. Normally it depends a lot on what their crimes are, what their situation is as far as if they're going to get out anytime soon. Some of the guys that are in for a long time want to do counseling. They want to try to figure out a way. A lot of ways I hear from them is they want to find a purpose for all the stuff, bad stuff they've done, they want to usually try to help someone. Our younger guys will try to figure out ways that they can make money, honestly. They want to start a life, and I've had guys be as young as 18, 19, so that their mindset is “what can I do when I get out? This is a roadblock now what else can I do?” So we work a lot with the colleges so we can do applications for them and stuff like that. So the goal is for when they get out, hopefully to have a very short period from when they're out when they start, because then they have less time to mess up and be left by themselves to do whatever they're going to do.
Kirstan: Are there techniques that you use to draw someone out? Is there anything in terms of programs that are unique that are offered here?
James: We do. We use every tool we're given, honestly. Right now we have computers, we have VR headsets. We do a lot with the universities, with the colleges, we just offer everything. If they want to learn how to speak French, I’ll help tutor them in that. We don't struggle with attendance; that's one of the things. The school is one of their places here, that's their place. So we get a different, we're lucky, we get a different offender than anyone else sees. So, when they come into the school, the whole demeanor changes. We've had people come in before and say, “oh, I've never seen that guy smile. I've never heard that guy laugh,” and it's the type of thing that when we open the door, it all changes back and then they go back into their world. But with the school, it's completely different.
Kirstan: Creating an environment for that learning to take place, is important. You talked about digital learning, and I know Internet is not something that's used inside of a prison, but this digital learning is kind of a closed platform that gives you another tool and you talked about virtual reality, unpack that a bit for me.
James: Yeah, so the digital learning we have, it's a very closed Internet, like you said. So, it is something that can be uploaded, but then they can't go anywhere other than the education part. The VR headsets is much more of a, we've been using it as almost a mental health break for some of them. So the first time someone gets on it, we've had guys say like, “oh, I feel human again,” things like that. We had one guy cry. It's nice to see them, they really feel like it's a break. So, the first time everyone uses it, it's more of a mental health thing, they don't even learn anything. Then they say, “okay, can I redo that? Because I want to listen now.” And so that deals with a lot of like careers and stuff. Our digital learning is good, it's been a very good supplement to everything in the class. It offers a lot of courses that we don't have time or the ability to really show them in a lot of different things, interesting things. So, we have a guy who kind of has been stuck on grade 7/8 for a little while, he really doesn't like to do math, he's pretty literate, like he can, he can read, he can write, everything like that, he's very articulate when he speaks, but he doesn't want to really go any further. So, we've been trying to find stuff with him and now he can do PowerPoint presentations, he knows how to use Excel and stuff like that, so the computer's been great in that way.
Kirstan: So, because I'm assuming if one day you get out of prison, it's a digital world out there.
James: It’s more and more, yeah.
Kirstan: That must be really intimidating if you've been incarcerated for a long time and that shock of “oh, we have bank machines.” Everything's pretty much digital nowadays, so would you say that digital literacy is key?
James: Oh, for sure. We take it for granted because we've slowly been exposed and we've slowly been brought into the world of it and none of them have seen it though, or some of them haven't seen it. We have guys that have been here for 20 years, so if we release them without any of those tools, then it's kind of, we can't have the expectation they're not going to come back.
Kirstan: Right. And do you ever get asked how do I learn about, like, how do I apply for a job or write my resume? Would you help with that?
James: Yep. So, our grade 12 English course takes all that into account, so there's a part of it that is write your resume, do this, do this. So, they have, one of my guys actually just went down to minimum, or medium, and he left with three resumes he just wrote. So we try to give them all the tools, everything they need to succeed.
Kirstan: So what are some of the barriers that you see most often with those that you teach?
James: Here, at this prison, for sure, it's just the movement.
Kirstan: It’s disruptive for your teaching?
James: Well, people can only move one at a time, like one unit at a time. So, if we have like say twelve different populations, they can't be in the hall together.
Kirstan: I see. Because they can't, they're not compatible.
James: No, so if Healthcare is asking for someone, and the kitchen is asking for someone, and we're asking for someone, and Programs is asking for someone, the officers, who are fantastic here, all have to try to make it, it's like an air traffic controller trying to make it work so that everyone comes, but no one bumps into each other.
Kirstan: So that there’s no incidents, no violence, right?
James: And that's the that's the most important part.
Kirstan: That’s tricky.
James: So that's one of them, but also just the guys themselves, trying to get them to open up sometimes and trying to get them to realize that school is important. We're very lucky because normally it's a snowball effect. So, if you get a few guys that want to do it, they see some other people or those guys are seen doing well, other guys in that unit will want to come and then it just goes from there. And there's a lot of times where if a guy's getting out, like last week one of my guys was getting out, I was one of the ones that he wanted to see before he left. So, when he called me over, I didn't know what it was for, and it was just to say goodbye. Just someone I worked with, we worked together for over a year, got him his diploma and so he's leaving and he's hopeful he's not going to come back so that's probably the hardest part is it's one of the few jobs for we hope we never see them again. So you do so much with them and you put so much time into them and then you go, “well, I hope it's done.”
Kirstan: So what are you proud of in your work?
James: I can, over the 15 years, I can look back and still remember a lot of guys that I've helped and different things that they've done. It's like I said, it's tough to know you're never going to see them again unless you run into them somewhere or something like that. I remember I had a guy worked with, he was started with me, I think he was like grade 3, and then he worked all his way up. He got his diploma and then he said, “well, I need to move away from here, I don't want to be in this area, I need to learn French.” So we worked two years together on him learning French and he learned French, got it down well enough that he could go to Quebec, that's where he was released, and one day I went out to see a concert, I mean, I don't know what the chances are, I know in Moncton I've never really met up with anyone, but in Quebec I heard him yell for me when I was in the mall, which I don't know if you know the mall there, but it's pretty huge. And he came over, gave me a hug, showed me pictures of his family and stuff like that, so it's that kind of stuff that we're so proud of and we see it happen so often and we do graduations here probably two to three times a month.
Kirstan: To mark, that milestone of achieving your General Education Degree (GED)?
James: GED, high school, college, we have a guy who just did a university course and completed it, got a B-plus and he was disappointed with that, but we did a ceremony for him as well. So when we see and do those ceremonies, we're both very proud.
Kirstan: So, I think for our listeners too, it's important to realize that education is about not only productively occupying your time when you're incarcerated because you have to do meaningful things so that you stay out of trouble in a way, and also, if you do get an eventual release, you want to make sure that it's one that is safe and that they're able to be productive, law-abiding citizens so that they don't come back. Is there anything else that you want to tell our listeners you might have forgot to mention?
James: No, my partner Kelsey did want to be here today, but she is on vacation, so I would be sad not to mention her as well because we really are a team here. It's one of the things that makes it so well, and I think one of the reasons we do so well is because we are such a good team with different skills and it's been, yeah, it makes the job very enjoyable.
Kirstan: Great. Well, thank you very much for your time and a shout out to all your teacher colleagues across the country that do great work to help rehabilitate federal offenders in our custody.
James: Perfect. Thank you!
Kirstan: Thanks.
Kirstan: Now let's hear my conversation with Glen, who was James's student when he was incarcerated at Atlantic Institution. When I met Glen, he had recently transferred to a medium security institution.
Kirstan: Thanks for being here and welcome. We're doing a podcast related to education and programs, and I wanted to hear more about your star story being here at Springhill Institution. How long have you been here?
Glen: I've only been here for two weeks.
Kirstan: Oh okay! And how's it been?
Glen: Fantastic. I was here years ago on another sentence and when I was released, I wasn't really the same mindset as I am now. So now that I'm in kind of a little bit more of a growth stage in my life, things have gone a lot easier.
Kirstan: Okay, and what kind of programs or education have you done?
Glen: Well in the educational part, I have computer courses. There's 60 or so different courses you can choose from, everything from hands on trades, computer courses, literacy courses, everything. I've done parenting courses, carpentry, a few different machining courses and welding and things like that. I also completed my grade 12 diploma, in fact.
Kirstan: Oh, congratulations!
Glen: I just got it today.
Kirstan: Oh, beautiful! Showing me his diploma. Oh, that's wonderful. From the government of New Brunswick.
Glen: Yeah, I'm pretty proud of it.
Kirstan: 90% in math, amazing. Law, 96. It's great.
Glen: Go figure, right? (laughs)
Kirstan: That's great. That's something to be proud of.
Glen: Yeah.
Kirstan: So that was quite an achievement. How long did that take?
Glen: Uh, four months.
Kirstan: Oh, that's pretty good!
Glen: Yeah, well, I put my head down. I had a lot of time in my cell and I sat down.
Kirstan: Just focused on it.
Glen: It was a major goal for me.
Kirstan: Yeah, good! And that's accomplished, what's next?
Glen: Well, I've applied for school at Athabasca University for developmental psychology and I'm covered by second chance scholarship program. So hopefully I'll be starting that first of June.
Kirstan: So you'll be staying here for a while and then doing, hopefully, more education?
Glen: Yeah, absolutely.
Kirstan: Nice. And I know I heard a bit about you taking up writing while you were inside at CSC, tell me a bit about that.
Glen: Well, I’ve been writing my whole life. A lot of poetry, a couple short stories, I did a biography when I was younger, never ended up getting finished. (laughs) But just right before Christmas, I decided I was gonna, well, I was writing my children poems, and I decided that I wanted to turn one of the poems into a book. I had notebooks sitting on my desk and I said, “you know what? That would make a fantastic little book for the kids.” So, I started writing each line of the poem onto each page and, you know what? I may as well illustrate it. So I spent about a month and a half illustrating the whole book, colouring it, and Christmas Day I finished it for them.
Kirstan: Wonderful. And how did they get it? Did you get to see them?
Glen: I haven't got to see them yet, unfortunately. They're in foster care right now. I plan on getting them back in my custody as soon as I get out.
Kirstan: So how did they get the book?
Glen: I sent it to them in the mail. They received their copy of the original the same day that I received sample copy from the publisher. So, I had a phone call to have let them read the book to me while I followed along. I was in tears the whole time.
Kirstan: Yeah. Must have been meaningful for them.
Glen: Oh yeah. And you know what? I have four daughters, so the two of them are with their grandparents and the two that were in foster care was the ones I wrote the book for cause I know they're feeling alone. They didn't have anybody close to them that they loved, that they knew, and I wanted the book to be special to them, so there's pictures of them all through it. Our family dog, our living room and I called the book Daddy's Got You.
Kirstan: So great. Do they do they write to you now, your children?
Glen: They, they don't write very much. I've gotten one letter from them. But it's difficult cause all of our correspondence has to go through children's aid before it gets to me and before it gets to them.
Kirstan: And so you're proud of your book, of course?
Glen: Oh yeah, very proud of it.
Kirstan: So you're going to do another?
Glen: Thinking about it.
Kirstan: Yeah?
Glen: I am thinking about it. I've got another poem, it was a short poem, but I was taking a look at it and I said, “you know what? I think I can add a couple more verses to this and put this on paper too.”
Kirstan: So is it something where it gives you an opportunity to reflect on like your life and your experience and translate that into a creative poetry, storytelling?
Glen: My life and experience, not so much in the poems. The poems are just a, you know, designed to make them feel warm, you know what I mean? But I've used my experiences and some of the things I've learned in some of my other creative writing. I don't know if you guys heard about my grade 12 English paper I wrote.
Kirstan: I didn't, please tell me!
Glen: It's called Toxic Waste, and it was, basically, about the toxic effects of unhealthy masculine traits and how it affects children growing up and passed down through generations. I couldn't put that in all in the title, so I just called it toxic waste. (laughs) But yeah, I think a lot of that was things that I noticed while growing up. I was raised by a single mother and I still developed toxic masculine traits. (laughs) And I see how it affected me growing up and how it affected me in school, socially, and it started to develop unhealthy traits that I didn't want passed on to my children. And now even though I have all four daughters, I'm still able to pass on toxic masculine traits to my daughters and they see unhealthy representation of what a man is supposed to be, right? So that was kind of, in a nutshell, what I was trying to focus on in Toxic Waste.
Kirstan: And what kind of advice would you give others in terms of, if they're in here, trying to kind of pursue some goals, and they feel a bit discouraged, what kind of advice have you have you learned that you could pass on?
Glen: Well, they're willing to help as much as you're willing to give. If you're, if you're willing to go that extra mile, so is the institution. I hear so many guys, they say, “oh, they don't want to do crap for you here, they don't care,” you know? But that's not true at all. There people willing to help. Ff you want the resources, they're there.
Kirstan: You have to be open, right?
Glen: You have to be open. You have to have that desire to do better. You know, you have to go out and take it. They're not just gonna come to you and hand you a diploma and come to you and hand you courses, you have to go out looking for them
Kirstan: To work for it.
Glen: Yeah, and as you start making better choices, everything starts to compound. You know you start to feel good things coming in and it makes it easier to keep pushing. You start to feel that gratification.
Kirstan: So you'd say change is possible?
Glen: Oh definitely is possible, yeah.
Kirstan: If you put your mind to it and your heart?
Glen: Unfortunately, it took me 37 years to figure that out but, yeah, I'm done with this life myself.
Kirstan: That's great. Great, so what's next?
Glen: Well…
Kirstan: School?
Glen: Yeah.
Kirstan: More school?
Glen: Yeah.
Kirstan: So, do you hope to be able to help others one day with a psychology degree?
Glen: That's my plan. I want to go into addictions. My community is really taking it bad. The same streets where I grew up playing in in front yards and stuff for now riddled full of needles and people sleeping in tents. You know, the homeless shelter’s just packed, overflowing out onto the street. They're had to open up another one, and this is a small town of, you know, 9,000 people and you can't play in the parks. There are signs up that say that the not to wear bare feet or let children play because the hypodermic needles. People that I grew up with that, you know, had bright futures are overdosing on fentanyl.
Kirstan: It's such a crisis.
Glen: It is, it really is. So, I'd like to go into addictions. Addiction, I mean it, it's a major thing for me. I've experienced both sides of the fence. I've been addicted to some of the worst drugs out there and I've fought through them and I overcame them and I've watched my family struggle and worry about me, worry whether or not I was going to come home that night. I've sold all my things and, you know, watched my life go down the tubes. Case in point: me being in prison. I got sober just shortly before coming in and when I came in, the mother of my children, she fell back into addiction. So when I came in, I had to sit back and watch her deteriorate and nothing I could do about it. The money got spent, our house got lost, my cars got sold and ultimately the children gone. Children are back in care now. So like I said, I've seen it from both sides of the fence and it's humbling and eye-opening when you see all the effects that substance abuse has on families.
Kirstan: Absolutely.
Glen: And when I say eye-opening, I mean, it opened my eyes to see what type of damage that I had been doing in the past, selling drugs and using drugs and encouraging my friends to use drugs and, you know, how many of them had families that were concerned about them? How many of them couldn't pay their bills? Children go without presents, you know? Children go hungry because their families spend all their money on drugs, you know? So this year's definitely been a big eye-opener for me.
Kirstan: Yeah. Well, it seems like you're on a good journey and doing well in taking care of yourself and focusing on the things you need to focus on, so I wish you all the best in in the next steps and again, congratulations, that's an amazing accomplishment.
Glen: Thank you very much.
Kirstan: To get that today, you know, it's an affirmation, right, of all the hard work you put in.
Glen: Absolutely, and that's what makes it all real.
Kirstan: Good. Well, thanks for coming today. I really appreciate it.
Glen: Thank you very much for having me.
Kirstan: Thank you to our guests for sharing their experiences with us. This has been a production of the Correctional Service of Canada and I've been your host, Kirstan Gagnon. Thanks for listening.