The “Webberites”: A community’s fight to bring education to the incarcerated.

March 23, 2009

Jacqueline Bischof (Copyright)

Educating in exile

When Sean Pica was 15 years old, his grandmother presented him with a small, framed quote
from the Scriptures. It was a gift he did not take very seriously. He put it aside and did not
think of it until 11 years later when, serving a sentence for a murder he had committed at 16,
he met the Reverend George “Bill” Webber. Webber was visiting incarcerated men like Pica,
who were facing an indeterminate future in prison. He read the men the same quote Pica had
received at 15, Jeremiah 29:4-7, God‟s advice to the exiled Israelites:

“This is what the Lord almighty, the God of Israel, says to all those I carried into exile from
Jerusalem to Babylon: „Build houses and settle down; plant gardens and eat what they
produce. Marry and have sons and daughters; find wives for your sons and give your
daughters in marriage, so that they too may have sons and daughters. Increase in number
there; do not decrease. Also, seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried
you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper.”
It is a quote that most people in contact with Bill Webber know by heart.

In 1982, when Bill Webber was president of the New York Theological Seminary, he became
Director of the Masters of Professional Studies degree at Sing Sing maximum security prison.
The degree program, which he helped to found, was meant to provide a deeply challenging,
thought-provoking and highly intellectual study of theology for inmates who had previously
completed a college degree and had been involved in humanitarian service during their
incarceration.

Webber had spent most of the previous 20 years as a pastor in Harlem before assuming the
presidency of the Seminary in 1968. He helped turn the Seminary around from its position of
financial difficulty and built up its reputation as a school for the training of scholars and
clergy in grassroots humanitarian work and pastoral care. Prison education became Webber‟s
main occupation when, in 1981, he was approached by Pastor Ed Mueller, a chaplain at
Green Haven prison, to discuss setting up a curriculum for prisoners of faith.

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Although the curriculum of the MPS program – which includes classes on ethics, church
history, bible studies, theology and pastoral care – is Christian-based, the program is open to
people of all faiths. Christians, Muslims, Jehovah‟s Witnesses, Rastafarians, agnostics and
atheists have all earned the degree, writing essays and class assignments that spring from
their own beliefs. Students from across New York State go through a rigorous application
process to get into the program. They must submit several letters of recommendation and
write a personal statement demonstrating they have worked in community service during
their incarceration. They must also have the approval of the Department of Correctional
Services for their transfer to Sing Sing for the duration of their study.

The Seminary encourages, if not compels, students to work as leaders in the prisons they find
themselves “exiled” in. Students use the Jeremiah quote as a type of mantra, a source of
inspiration during their years of imprisonment.

Fourteen years after the program started, Webber, a fervent advocate of prison education,
watched horrified as Bill Clinton signed into effect the Violent Crime Control and Law
Enforcement Act of 1994. The act banned prison inmates from applying for grants to fund
their education while incarcerated. The act effectively obliterated prison education programs
across America. For over two decades after his retirement as president of New York
Theological Seminary, Webber continued to campaign for the re-introduction of secondary
and tertiary education in prison. He knew that the withdrawal of the grants, which were a
vital supplement to private donations, would make it almost impossible for colleges to
continue to run degree programs in prison. Former student Julio Medina likened the effect of
the Pell Grants withdrawal to Webber‟s “having both his arms ripped off.”

The economic and social benefits of programs like the MPS have been widely demonstrated.
Education has been shown to lower rates of return to prison, and the cost of educating one
prisoner is substantially lower in the long-term than the cost of imprisonment if he or she
returns to incarceration. Despite this, most politicians have avoided returning to the subject of
education in prison since 1994. Graduates of the MPS program at Sing Sing, and the teachers
who have taught there over the years, share Webber‟s frustration at the lack of political
pressure for the return of government funding for prison education.

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A focus on Koinonia, the Greek word for community or fellowship, is what makes the MPS
program unique. Students in the program are required to have engaged in community service
during their imprisonment, and they are asked to commit themselves to a life of humanitarian
service. This includes work within the prison community on initiatives and also extends to
community service post-release.

Webber is 89 and due to frail health, could not be interviewed for this story. His years
directing the MPS program, and campaigning in the field of prison education, helped to
create a community of graduates and activists who work daily to keep people out of prison,
and to ensure that those in prison have the chance to learn.

Sean Pica was released the same year of his graduation, 2002, and began working at
organizations such as Community Access in Harlem, which assists people with psychiatric
disabilities live independently. Pica went on to earn a second Master‟s in Social Work at
Hunter College and eventually became executive director of Hudson Link. This non-profit
helps Sing Sing inmates study for undergraduate college degrees through Mercy College, a
liberal arts institution in Dobb‟s Ferry, New York.

“When I met Bill Webber, and he talked about that quote ... it just knocked me off my ass. I
had never delved into scripture [before]. Everyone was talking about going home and not
talking about what we‟re doing in [prison]” says Pica. “All of a sudden he‟s created rank and
file social workers, troops and troops of case managers.”

Branching Out

Some of those “rank and file social workers” include facilitators for UTH Turn, an
organization for at-risk-youth: Gary Bynum, Melvin Isaacs and Anthony Simpson in the
Bronx, Staten Island and Brooklyn; assistant imam Mika‟il DeVeaux in Harlem, re-entry
advocate Julio Medina in East Harlem, and Brooklyn-based Doe Fun employees Paul
Satterfield and Felipe Vargas, who assist adults who have been released from prison.
These are just a handful of the paroled men who, across New York City, dedicate their skills
and experience (both negative and positive) to community service and empowerment. Most
had been involved in service while incarcerated even before they entered the Seminary‟s

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program, and through it had become more aware of their own spirituality and leadership
potential, garnering the confidence to re-enter society and work in service.

Melvin Isaacs, a 1998 MPS graduate, was released in 2003 after spending almost three
decades in prison. He is a successful artist who has a weekly show on Brooklyn Community
Access Television. He teaches Sign Language at a Staten Island church, having picked up this
skill as well as the ability to read Braille after befriending members of the hearing and sight
impaired community in prison. Isaacs is also a facilitator for UTH Turn, and has been
running a site in Staten Island since September 2008.

UTH Turn provides mentoring and activities for youth at risk of incarceration and has
branches in Manhattan, Staten Island, Brooklyn and the Bronx. The organization sprang out
of the MPS program ten years ago, when a graduate remarked during his commencement
ceremony that if he had known his peers when he was young, he would not have landed in
prison. The organization started with the support of Webber and occupies the same floor as
the New York Theological Seminary‟s offices in Manhattan. MPS graduates often get their
first job there after release, working as facilitators and mentors to girls and boys between 13
and 21. Some of the youths enrol in the program voluntarily, while others are referred by the
Administration of Children Services, or enroll as part of an Alternative to Incarceration
program run by the Office of Children and Family Services.

A conversation with Isaacs is incomplete if he does not show you the sketch books he carries
with him. They are filled with beautifully drawn portraits by the children he works with.
UTH Turn allows its facilitators to develop their own techniques for connecting with the kids.
Isaacs uses art therapy. He takes pictures of the kids, prints them out and places them on a
light box with a piece of sketch paper over them. The kids sit and trace their features, lit up
from below. It is a rare opportunity for them to concentrate on themselves and a popular
activity among the 50 kids Isaacs has attracted to the program since it started in Staten Island.

Isaacs also attracts kids into the program from the streets by offering training in film
production and occasionally a spot on his TV show.

Isaacs is a visual person who enjoys describing his work with sketches on a whiteboard,
explaining how he assigns producer, director and floor manager roles during filming

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workshops. He describes his role at the Staten Island site as that of mentor and constant
presence, someone who understands what troubled kids are experiencing and the direction
they‟re heading in and is able to talk to them “straight.”

“If you don‟t talk to them straight they will cut corners on you, and then you aint going
nowhere with them,” says Isaacs. “If you let them know that you want them [in the program]
they‟re not used to that ... and they want more of that.”

The most significant consequence of completing the MPS program for Isaacs is the way it
makes students more aware of their potential to learn, and to help their communities. “The
value of the program is very high,” he says. “The program gave us another way of thinking ...
to embrace the community and have an impact on human services. Being one step closer to a
PhD and being more employable because of the Masters are incredible assets to have, he
says. This leads to a greater sense of pride and confidence, “something that you don‟t
normally have when you get out.”

Dr. Mark Chapman, a teacher in the MPS program for 12 years, says the program‟s gift of
self-esteem and intellectual confidence affects not only the men, but also everyone they come
in contact with. Chapman is the Associate Director of African and African American studies
at Fordham University, and teaches the MPS introductory courses in Christian Ethics and
Systematic Theology.

“When you can achieve a college degree or a Master's degree in prison, it says something
about your character, that you can stick with something,” says Chapman. “And then when
you have children, your spouse or parents come into the graduation, let me tell you ... these
graduation ceremonies have been the high point. When you see the [family] of the person
who is getting their degree that day, how their eyes fill with tears, how they've been so moved
by the success of their loved one, it's very moving.”

Since it began in 1982, over 300 men have graduated from the MPS program and 160 have
been paroled. The Seminary is proud to point out that graduates have an 11 percent
recidivism (return to prison) rate, compared to the New York state overall rate of 42 percent.
As a result of the Pell grant withdrawal, the Seminary has experienced a drop in the pool of
applicants who have completed undergraduate degrees and are thus eligible for a Masters.

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The Reverend Dale Irvin, president of the New York Theological Seminary, describes
Webber at the time being intent on “singlehandedly returning college programs to New York
State.”

“The issue that we confronted in the 90s is the same one that we confront today,” says Irvin.
“In the 90s the punishment theme was on the rise, and in that mode people don‟t want men to
come out of prison. They mentality was „lock them up and throw away the key,‟ and people
didn‟t care about recidivism.”

Irvin describes Webber as a “visionary,” calling the MPS program “the soul of the seminary.”
“It was always Bill‟s theme that you were called to create shalom in the city – to bring peace
to the city, that was always his guiding theme from Jeremiah 29,” says Irvin. Describing
Webber‟s work in Sing Sing prison, which is located upstream from the Hudson River, (and
long ago inspired the phrase “sent up the river” to refer to a prison sentence), Irvin says: “He
saw early on the connections between prisons and urban violence. Bill used to say that
instead of just fishing bodies out of the river you have to go upstream and stop whoever‟s
throwing them into the river.”

Everyone who came into contact with Webber was struck by his humility, says Chapman, his
commitment to the cause of prison education, and his intense energy. Webber retired as
President of the Seminary in 1982. He continued to stay on as full-time faculty until 1992,
and was director of the MPS program from 1984 until 2000, when Dr. Edward Hunt took
over. In between devoting his time to the program and its students, he would walk five or six
miles a day, according to Chapman.

“At the time I was with him [teaching at Sing Sing], I had trouble keeping up with him. We
would walk throughout the facility and climb long, long steps,” Chapman laughs. “At the
time, I was in my mid-thirties. He was in his early eighties.”

Chapman says that Webber was transformed by the men in the MPS program. “As he saw
them change, it gave him such a tremendous gift,” he says. “You know, Jesus said, 'Give, and
it shall be given unto you.‟ The gift that he's received from the men who were his students,
the love and honor and respect with which they hold him, the esteem in which they regard
him, was I think something that kept him going."

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Meeting Webber in 1993, and completing his Masters in 2001, compelled Anthony Simpson
to give back to his community after over two decades in prison.
“He said one thing in the sessions we had that sticks with me everyday that I walk,” says
Simpson. “He said, „Now that you‟ve come through the Masters program, gone through
intensive study, met so many people through our relationships ... now that you‟ve
accomplished this without having to pay a dime, you owe the same debt to society.‟ And
that‟s what I do.”

Simpson is now a UTH Turn facilitator in Brooklyn, a position he took up after his release in
2006. While incarcerated, Simpson had mentored troubled youth through the Youth
Assistance Program program, and so starting work through UTH Turn was a natural
progression.

The men connect with the kids because they see themselves reflected in them, says Simpson.
Maybe that‟s what also compels them to call on and visit the kids after hours, even those that
have left or dropped out of the program.

Simpson says that growing up, he had a good relationship with his mother, who raised him
and his brother alone, and worked doggedly to provide for the family. Seeing her struggle as
a young teenager to provide for the family, Simpson decided he wanted to help but fell in
with the wrong people and began stealing. Failing to make the “positive choice” to get a job,
he says, eventually led to almost 30 years in prison. His mother died before he was released.

“Even though I knew that [doing] these things was wrong, I still did them because of the
things around me,” says Simpson. “As I grew, I realized that I could‟ve done better, whether
my father was home or not, I still had the choice. And the big thing that we try to instil in
these young people is that, you have a choice, the choice is yours ... you can choose to do
right, or you can choose to do wrong.”

The experience of studying in prison forced Simpson to think about his future, he says, and
that is what he tries to do with the children he works with now.

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“The biggest challenge I see with youth today is the lack of understanding about their future.
At least the youths we deal with, they don‟t see too far ahead,” says Simpson. “And our goal
is to make sure that they see graduation ahead.”

Gary Bynum, a UTH Turn facilitator who works at their site in the Bronx, says that some of
the children are so traumatized from their circumstances that often the most important service
he can provide is his constant presence and accessibility as a mentor. Bynum uses dance and
music to distract the kids from their troubles, inviting local church youth to join the dance
groups in order to encourage positive interaction. He is a 2004 MPS graduate who served 18
years in prison. Bynum is quiet and reserved in conversation, with a sadness in his voices as
he describes his work. But it is clear the work gives him joy as he breaks out in smiles and
bops his head when he watches his kids perform.

Bynum has often had moments of helplessness and frustration in his work.

“I call it like this, we‟re in a boat, right, and the child‟s out in the water, but he‟s just too far
out to get to,” says Bynum. “And he‟s going to actually have to drown, go through some
changes and experiences, and when he comes back up, if he comes back up, maybe from that
experience he will be motivated to get in the boat where it‟s safe. Because by the time I got to
him, it‟s just too late. And that is the hardest part right there.”

The youth have to find peace in themselves before they move on to better lives, says Bynum,
much like the men in the MPS program had to find their own peace in order to survive and
flourish during their incarceration and after their release.

Bynum, Isaacs and Simpson gather at UTH Turn‟s office in Morningside Heights every
Tuesday with other facilitators to discuss their week‟s work and any other issues or concerns
they might have. Their meetings are often facilitated by the Reverend Vernon Mason, one of
the directors of the program.

“The people who graduate from the program ... are some of the finest people I‟ve been
privileged to teach and work with,” enthuses Mason, who has also taught classes for the MPS
program. He says that it is unlikely the program would exist without the passion and hard
work of the graduates. “In a very real sense, these graduates, who have committed themselves

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while incarcerated, upon their release, work and dedicate their lives to see that young men
and women get education, get jobs – do all the things without succumbing to the pathology of
the streets and of crime.”

Building Bill’s Legacy

Mason, Bynum, Isaacs – talk to any of the MPS graduates and teachers, most of whom have
spent decades living or working in prisons, and they will, unprompted, talk about Webber and
the change he brought to their lives. They talk pointedly about how correctional education
helped set them on a better path once outside of prison, and discuss, with frustration, the
extent to which the benefits of education in prison have been disregarded by politicians at a
state and federal level since 1994.

The argument over whether or not prisons should serve as places of rehabilitation or as places
of punishment has gone back and forth for centuries. The popular view in the 1970s was that
education was an important way to help prisoners prepare for a law-abiding life outside.
Inmates were allowed to apply for Pell Grants, which, when awarded, were given to the
institution providing the education.

Professor Harry Dammer, Professor and Chair of Sociology and Criminal Justice at the
University of Scranton, describes the shift in attitude over the past decades as both political
and illogical.

In the 1960s, Lyndon Johnson first recognized and attacked the links between crime, poverty,
and poor education with his “Great Society” anti-poverty programs. During his presidency,
Richard Nixon popularized his view that criminals were citizens who rationally chose to
commit crime, and who needed to be punished rather than rehabilitated. Nixon pushed for
increased spending on anti-organized crime initiatives, supported a tougher fight with drugs
and supported the improvement of correctional and law-enforcement facilities. Eventually
Ronald Reagan emphasized the need to be “tough on crime” in order to deal with the
problem. Years of this mentality cumulated in a conservative, aggressive approach to crime
that was highly politicized.

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Eventually, in a response to isolated incidences of violence such as the 1993 shooting of eight
people in California, President Bill Clinton signed into law a bill that encapsulated the tough
on crime approach: mandatory sentencing for drug offenders, the “three strikes” law (an
extended and mandatory period of incarceration for repeat offenders), stricter parole
conditions, gun control ... and fewer educational opportunities for inmates.

The Violent Crime and Law Enforcement Act reflected the increasingly popular view that
harsher sentences and longer prison terms would serve to frighten people and drive down
crime. This view accompanied, or perhaps even encouraged, a negative opinion of
correctional education; that it was unfair that tax payer money was providing the incarcerated
with free education, whilst law-abiding civilians had to pay their way.

This approach often had more to do with politics than logic, says Dammer. “Crime is one of
the few problems in America that is developed by public opinion and by politicians,” he says.
Academic assessments of crime and incarceration are not taken seriously by politicians or the
public, explains Dammer. “When a bridge collapses, we have commissions that study the
problem and the solutions and then we rationally decide what to do,” says Dammer. “In
criminal justice, we react based on one or a few instances and we make decisions not based
on research or consensus but on irrational and emotional feelings ... Nowhere else in policy
making is such irrationality encouraged or supported,” he says.

Banning prisoners from applying for Pell Grants defied the urgent appeals of academics in
the correctional education field and the Department of Education, who presented evidence
showing that educational programs helped lower recidivism rates. They also argued that Pell
Grants for prisoners had never amounted to more than one percent of the total money alloted.
The act effectively crippled many higher education programs in prisons across the United
States. While Basic Adult Education, vocational programs and G.E.D programs continued to
be supported to some degree, most programs run by colleges in correctional facilities across
the country had to be shut down.

Dammer echoes the frustration felt by others across the prison education field: “It's the single
thing that annoys me the most,” he says. “If I could do one thing as ruler of the criminal
justice universe, it would be to put education back in prison."

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In 1994, John Valverde, who three years earlier had been sentenced to 30 years in prison, was
working as an assistant to the Education Supervisor at Sing Sing prison. He had just
completed his undergraduate degree through Mercy College, based just north of New York
City, which at the time was running education programs in eight prisons across New York
State, including Sing Sing. Mercy College had to cut its educational programs in prisons after
the Pell Grants were withdrawn.

“I was working in the [Sing Sing] school building, so I remember when Mercy College
closed their offices and packed their boxes,” says Valverde. “I assisted them in packing their
books and records and helping them pack their trucks, and at the time there were so many
people who were 12 credits short of their degree, within a semester or a year of their degree.
There was certainly desperation and frustration in the population.”

Valverde enrolled in the MPS program in 1995, which survived the withdrawal of the Pell
Grants on a base of private funding and donations. That year, the importance of education in
prison was on the mind of the MPS students.

“Our class took on the challenge of education and what we could do about [the withdrawal of
the grant],” says Valverde. “During the school year for the Masters program, many of us
shared the experience of Mercy leaving ... and shared the experience of being in college and
what it meant to us.”

The 1995 class decided to meet to think of ways to carry on college initiatives in prison
without their former funding. Sean Pica was at Sing Sing at the time, and was pulled into the
group because he had completed several courses at Mercy but was short of a few credits for
his undergraduate degree. The MPS students knew he would be a good candidate for the
credit-earning program they were trying to launch. But in prison, just meeting to talk wasn‟t
easy.

“You can‟t even gather in groups of five without breaking institutional rules – how do you
get together to brainstorm educational initiatives?” says Pica. “We snuck around a lot, and the
guards themselves were the ones that were very supportive.”

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With the help of Bill Webber and members of the Rye Presbyterian Church who met monthly
with the men to discuss different topics, a group of civilians, advocates, professors and prison
administrators formed to brainstorm the return of college programs with private funding.
John Valverde represented the incarcerated students. With the support of the group and the
administration of Sing Sing, a few of the MPS graduates started offering a Certificate of
Ministry and Human Service program, which allowed students to earn college credits from
the New York Theological Seminary.

A partnership was formed with Nyack College, who agreed to put these credits towards an
undergraduate degree. The Nyack partnership eventually expanded into degrees offered
through Mercy College.

Hudson Link, a non-profit organization that helps find the funding needed to cover the costs
of the Mercy College programs, was formed to carry out the administrative work and
fundraising that the group of advocates initially visualized. So far, 150 men have graduated
with Mercy College degrees in the ten years that Hudson Link has existed.

Pica, the executive director, is quick to point out that of the 37 men who have been paroled so
far, not one has returned to a correctional facility.

Webber and his group formed a small part of a large community that was railing against the
injustice they felt was inherent in the Pell Grant withdrawal. In 2003, two academics from
Bard College released an article titled: “Education as Crime Prevention: The Case for
Reinstating Pell Grant Eligibility for the Incarcerated.” Daniel Karpowitz and Max Kenner
were part of the Bard Prison Initiative which, for twenty years, has offered a liberal arts
degree, sponsored by Bard College, inside three long-term maximum-security and two
transitional medium-term prisons. Karpowitz and Kenner urged a reconsideration of the Pell
Grant withdrawal, arguing that “postsecondary education is the most successful and cost-
effective method of preventing crime,” and pointing out that inmates accessed less than one
percent of the grants in 1993.

Kenner says that the article was intended for a few people in government, and did not attract
“a particular widespread response.” The argument about the return of the Pell Grants, he says,

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is not just a practical one (in terms of reducing recidivism and money spent on prisons), but
an ethical one.

“It's true, politics and public support comes back to these issues,” says Kenner. “When the
programs were destroyed, they weren't destroyed for any rational reason, but for ethical
reasons, that these people don't deserve access to this, they don't deserve access to a
classroom with teachers. And it's my belief that this argument, about money, and recidivism,
won't be effective in returning public support. We need to make an ethical argument - similar
to one that destroyed programs years ago, which includes [viewing] people in prison, people
returning from or going to prison as our neighbors and fellow citizens.”

Even though the debate over the Pell grants has largely disappeared from the public sphere, it
continues to be a topic within the academic field of correctional education. Studies on the
issue highlight the growing numbers of prisoners crowding correctional facilities despite a
dramatic drop in crime over the last decade. Rates of incarceration have more than doubled
since 1985, according to a 2006 Educational Testing Service study, with most inmates
entering the system illiterate and largely unemployable by the time they leave.

“While this country has not ratcheted up its investments in correctional education while
adopting a „get tough on crime‟ approach,” wrote the study‟s authors, “it must recognize that
providing prisoners with the education and job skills they need to stay out of prison can save
scarce resources in the long run.”

Studies such as these have argued that educational programs, particularly college programs,
dramatically decrease recidivism rates amongst the paroled by not only increasing
employability, but also by fostering self-reflection and a sense of pride amongst students that
assists their transition into society upon release.

Living the Networks

That sense of pride and enthusiasm is evident in the offices of Exodus Transitional
Community in East Harlem. At the entrance to the organization‟s office is a large framed
collage, filled with photographs of MPS graduates over the past few years. Darryl Johnson, a
program coordinator at Exodus, points out some of the men in the photographs; John

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Valverde, Dr. Mark Chapman and Exodus founder Julio Medina appear. So does Eric Waters,
a graduate who is now head of the Osborne Association, a non-profit that helps paroled
prisoners and their families upon their release. Many of the pictures have the men beaming
proudly in graduation gowns, standing next to or in conversation with Bill Webber.

“This is where it all started really,” says Johnson. “And Julio is the man! Mentor, life coach,
tyrant!” Medina laughs at this character exposé.

Many graduates of the MPS program have had their start on the “outside” with Exodus
Transitional Community, a re-entry organization for formerly incarcerated men and women
founded and run by Medina, a 1994 MPS graduate. Medina earned a level of fame (and an
intensely busy schedule) when President George Bush praised Exodus in his 2004 State of the
Union address. He‟s been to the White House five times since, and was present for Bush‟s
farewell speech.

Medina, who describes himself and other MPS graduates as “Webberites,” is also assistant
director of the MPS program at Sing Sing, a position he took after earning a Masters in
Divinity from the New York Theological Seminary after his release. He meets with students
every other Thursday, and teaches life skills in a sense, equipping students with the skills
they need when they are released.

Shortly after his release, Medina describes how long and difficult his search was for a job and
how, during his unemployment, he was getting resumés from friends who were still
incarcerated, looking forward to working when they were released.

“I said that if I can‟t get a job, what about the people without a Masters, the people I‟ve
tutored, the people I taught classes to?”

Medina describes standing at the train station on West 125th street in Manhattan shortly after
his two-month search for employment ended, wondering how he could help. “In those
moments I realized I needed something for the men and women.”

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Medina is passionate about re-entry assistance and the benefits this assistance has for society.
Exodus offers coaching and guidance to participants in the areas of education, family,
spirituality, employment, health and community involvement.

“Without good, premier re-entry programs, families will be more devastated than what they
already are, crime would be at a higher rate, public safety would be out of control, the city
would be spending more money on police officers and the state will be building more prisons,
tax payers will be eaten up by the money it will cause to Corrections,” says Medina. “For me,
re-entry programs are the core of people being successful when they get out.”

When Sean Pica was released, Medina taught him how to send a fax, and he helped Felipe
Vargas learn how to enter his PIN into an ATM to withdraw money – his own for the first
time in decades. Vargas went on to establish a Criminal Justice program at the Doe Fund, an
organization that assists homeless and formerly incarcerated people re-establish themselves in
society through employment, basic education and substance abuse counselling. The Criminal
Justice program provides assistance specifically for recently released prisoners.

Vargas, like the other men interviewed, returns again and again in conversation to the way
the MPS program and Bill Webber inspired students to realize their potential and the good
they could do in the community.

“What Bill taught us is what drives our work out here; that you can‟t disregard people, you
have to give them an opportunity to fail,” says Vargas.

“We appreciated the gift we‟d been given, the education,” he says. “We had a deep
appreciation and gratitude for what God had given us, the skills we didn‟t know we had until
learnt we had them in prison.”

Vargas, spent 20 years inside and graduated from the MPS program in 1999. He works and,
from time to time, fishes with his fellow classmate Paul Satterfield, who served 25 years.
Satterfield is now a case manager at the Doe Fund.

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Satterfield recalls with amusement how Bill would take the students to Muslim, Jewish and
Christian services, regardless of their faith. “Bill used to say that there is more than one road
to God,” he says.

As head of Criminal Justice for the Doe Fund, Vargas has campaigned for the rights of the
incarcerated and views the lack of support for recently released prisoners with frustration. Re-
entry programs that provide employment and wrap-around services, much like educational
programs in correctional facilities, have a remarkable impact on bringing down recidivism,
but largely depend on private donations.

After all his efforts convincing the Doe Fund of the importance of a Criminal Justice
program, setting it up and watching it succeed in lowering recidivism rates of participants,
Vargas watched the program close down in March. The economic crisis caused the main
sponsors of the program to withdraw.

Mika‟il DeVeaux is a 1987 MPS graduate who also spent a lot of his time post-release
convincing a community of the importance of helping prisoners reintegrate into society.
DeVeaux was released in 2003 after earning a Bachelor and two Masters degrees during his
25 years in prison. After his release, DeVeaux worked to encourage the Muslim community
in New York to support those released from correctional facilities. These days he spends his
time performing the duties of an assistant imam at the mosque of Islamic Brotherhood in
Harlem. DeVeaux is vice-president of Citizens Against Recidivism, which was started by his
wife, Wanda Best-Deveaux.

Re-entry programs try to equip those coming out of incarceration with the skills to gain a
foothold in society. These skills range from recovering from addiction, finding employment
and learning to live with family members again, to such simple tasks, says Wanda Best-
DeVeaux, as remembering to close doors and be able to answer the question “When are you
coming home?” without answering, “Who do you think you are, a CO (correctional officer?)”

For Best-DeVeaux, the MPS graduates provide vital services to the community simply
because they‟ve been there.

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“It's imperative that when you are working with an individual who's had some kind of
psychological trauma such as prison - which is trauma to an individual, whether you've done
something wrong or not - to have someone talk to you who understands what it's like to be
locked in that tiny cell, having someone tell you when you can shower, eat, sleep, see your
loved ones, be locked in the box for 23 hours,” says Best-DeVeaux. “What these [MPS
graduates] bring is, „I understand, I've been there, and I'm an example of being committed to
your self-development, what you can become.‟”

Best-DeVeaux responds with frustration when asked about the debate surrounding the
withdrawal of the Pell grants, and by extension, college education, in correctional facilities.
“It's about being smart, not tough,” she says. “Everybody on the outside don't take advantage
of [education], everyone on the inside don't take advantage of it, but those that do come out
the better for it.”

Community works

DeVeaux and his wife speak with fondness of the annual MPS alumni reunion, which takes
place every January at Rye Presbyterian Church, half an hour outside of New York City. On
the day of the reunion, ice covered the sidewalks and roads, and the air was chill.

On the train trip from Grand Central Station up to Rye, UTH Turn facilitator Anthony
Simpson talked excitedly about the event. He wondered how many graduates would be able
to attend with the icy conditions of the road making driving dangerous. Most made the trip.
Volunteers from Rye Presbyterian Church have visited MPS students monthly at Sing Sing
since 1995, after parishioners Nancy and Bob Steed were invited to an MPS graduation
ceremony by an acquaintance. For almost 14 years the groups has met with students and
graduates at Sing Sing, as well as graduates who have been transferred to Fishkill and Mid-
Orange correctional facilities. The agenda of the meetings is set by the volunteers every
second month and the students every month in between.

Bob Steed says the intention of the meetings is not to preach, or to speak about theological
teachings that are already regular coursework for the students. “Instead we engage in
community building, developing skills needed on outside,” says Steed. “Communication
skills, dealing with way world works, and talking about important issues like family, how

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they maintain relationships when in jail, war and peace. We talk about anything that seems
important.”

The connections created by the MPS program between students, volunteers and teachers are
powerful and have served as the basis for community organizations, advocacy initiatives and,
most importantly, friendships. These connections, which are critical for the graduates during
their time in prison and after their release, are most apparent at the reunion, where graduates
greet each other as old friends, colleagues and peers.

Steed organizes a reunion lunch every year to give graduates a chance to tell their success
stories. The stories are impressive. Most graduates work in the field of humanitarian service;
as substance abuse and HIV and AIDS counsellors, mentors for at-risk youth, re-entry
facilitators, case managers for the homeless, teachers and spiritual leaders. The event is a
reunion amongst friends, but also a networking opportunity where released graduates can
meet with the newly paroled and provide assistance or set up networks where possible.

“The coolest thing is seeing them walking around in suits exchanging business cards,”
laughs Steed. “These are men I knew in green suits. To see them looking so smart and proud,
and networking ...”

The 2008 reunion started with a 10 am church service, with readings and prayers read by
MPS graduates, and a sermon by John Valverde. Valverde, who was released at the
beginning of 2008, explored the concept of personal transformation. He described this
transformation as an acceptance of being connected to everyone and everything, and having
complete compassion toward everyone. He explained how his own transformation in prison
was challenged when he was released, when he was gripped by a fear of judgement from
others in society – for his crime and his 16 years in prison.

A fear of judgement and rejection from society is often the root cause of recidivism, said
Valverde. He talked about how his experience and education in prison helped him overcome
that fear.

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“In truth, I saw that my 16 years in prison were not wasted. They were filled with purpose
and meaning. And now I lead a life full of potential and possibility, and all of you helped me
get here. Today I see clearly that, this is what God has asked of us all along.”

A few days later, during an interview, Valverde described the way in which education had
helped him to take responsibility for his life and for his crime. Despite this, he also
understands to a degree the reason the Pell Grants were withdrawn.

“It is a tough sell when there are a vast number of people who can't afford college education,
can barely meet the mortgage, pay their bills and you suddenly have person incarcerated
getting education for free,” says Valverde. “That is not a hard argument to grasp. Money and
economics has a big impact on whether or not people support something. And knowing that
you're paying to support people who have committed crimes ... is a really tough sell.”

Valverde says that this argument springs from a culture of “instant gratification” – where
people are more eager to see their tax payer money work immediately, as in more convictions
and higher rates of prison sentencing, than understanding that an education in prison means a
drop in crime and re-arrest, and a more productive life for a prisoner when they are released.

“I'm not sure people are really grasping or wanting to hear the message that this lowers
recidivism later,” says Valverde.

The argument of the importance of correctional education is unlikely to be revisited any time
soon, says Hudson Link director Sean Pica, despite the efforts of several MPS graduates.
“It's political suicide, says Pica. “Whoever raises this topic, they're over. Promoting prison
programs is not popular; promoting prison programs taxpayers have to pay for is not popular.
The Commissioner of Corrections, Brian Fisher, was the only one fighting for it for three
years and he's finally realized that he can't do it alone. And politically no one is sticking their
neck out for him. It needs to be more than him supporting it, and his budget is so
overburdened that it's not possible.”

Yet Pica has not given up on the idea, and continues to meet with senators to garner support
for college programs in correctional facilities, while ensuring that private funding keeps
Hudson Link going.

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Julio Medina says that he truly understood the argument against free correctional education
when he was teaching MPS students at Sing Sing while putting aside part of his monthly
salary to pay for the Masters of Divinity degree he was studying as a free man.

“It‟s a valid argument, except when you look at the real tiny percentage of tax money that
was going into [the Pell grants given to prisoners.] That‟s the part that didn‟t come out,” says
Medina. “It says a lot about corrections, and it says a lot about ... our country, that if you
commit a crime you shouldn‟t be educated.”

The MPS program changed his life, says Medina, turning him away from being a “taker of
things” and a leader “that led in the wrong direction.”

“That program, it was a flame that was ignited,” says Medina. “The Master of Professional
Studies allowed me to be that, quote unquote „same leader,‟ but in the right direction.”

“They saw that there was something wrong in what I did, but they were like, „wait a minute,
we can use you in our ministry, we can use you in God‟s army, on the streets.‟ That was the
first time I saw my skills were viable.”

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