Quoth Michael P:
> Gilligan, James. 1998. "Reflections From a Life Behind Bars: Build
> Colleges, Not Prisons." Chronicle of Higher Education (16 October): pp.
> B 7 and B 9.
> B9: Gilligan was the former head of the prison mental-health service in
> Massachusetts. He found that the most successful program for preventing
> recidivism. was the one that allowed inmates to receive a college degree
> while in prison. Several hundred prisoners in Massachusetts had
> completed at least a bachelor's degree while in prison over a 5 year
> period, and not one of them had been returned to prison for a new
> crime. "Immediately after I announced this finding in a public lecture
> at Harvard, and it made its way into the newspapers, our new governor,
> William Weld. who had not previously been aware that prison inmates
> could take college courses, gave a press conference on television in
> which he declared that Massachusetts should rescind that "privilege," or
> else the poor would start committing crimes in order to be sent to
> prison so they could get a free college education."
>
> And Weld is not even part of the far right!
Well, how did Gilligan's narrative on this matter conclude?
I think this is unwarranted paranoia, Michael.
I lived there during much of Weld's tenure, and recall him as
a charming guy who could joke a bit. He could even be funny,
if you forgot that he'd been many years a Federal prosecutor
beforehand. What actually became of the program?
valis
