Posts Tagged ‘parole’

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Welcome Back

December 29, 2012

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Edgar made it to the GED and passed! I brought the class cupcakes. Then Edgar went home on a weekend pass and decided to celebrate his achievement by going on a methamphetamine binge. He crawled back to me looking a bit unshaven, the young man with the perfect goatee whom I had photographed in cap and gown just a week earlier. I admit I was disappointed in Edgar. Wasn’t the diploma enough? I have to re-enroll him so I gave him his former intake sheets to check. When I reviewed them later I noticed he left his grade level at 9th grade, didn’t bother to check the box for GED.

Now that Edgar has his GED I have to design a different curriculum for his 40 hours, the mandatory required in our particular program. It’s difficult to help someone climb a ladder only to have to pick them up again at the bottom. How do you make that ladder appealing now? Edgar told me he wants to move to Alaska when he discharges parole, to work in the oil industry. So I told him, “You need to read the classics,” and handed him Jack London’s Call of the Wild. I also directed him to an online literary guide that outlines the book’s characters and setting, with discussion and questions.  I’m not finished helping Edgar but he’s got to help himself, break from the pack, the streets, crystal meth.

Posted in adult education, drug recovery, education, GED, meth | Tagged , , , | Leave a Comment »

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Intaking it personally

April 17, 2012

In the school where I work, every new student must go through an intake process that includes me asking them questions about their drug use and criminal history. The forms I fill out are important to the tracking and funding of our program and I always see this initial interview as an opportunity to get to know my students. On some days their words start to wash over me as the clients at the rehab often digress into personal tales.

“I have a detective coming to talk with me about being raped.” “I used meth and PCP together.” “The car accident, I can’t remember well.” “Seizures.” “I’ve been shot.” “I’m not here for drugs, I’ve had a terrible loss.” No one tells me they shot, robbed or beat someone — confessing their own misdeeds is a thin line few cross.

I have to remind myself that I am here to teach these guys and gals reading, writing and arithmetic. I’m not a social worker or a counselor, but I’m still empathic, intaking it all personally.

Posted in adult education, community, crime, drug recovery, education | Tagged , | Leave a Comment »

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Fear factor

March 27, 2011

Randall had been at the rehab for years. He was a youthful-looking African-American in his forties who dressed like a kid. To me, It looked like his mom had picked out his clothes, typically plaid shorts, a crisp white polo shirt, and tennis shoes. His clothes always looked new, right off the rack. His drug of choice, heroin. He had worked his way up the ladder in the community, making sure, during hourly monitoring, that everyone was accounted for; manning the reception desk; answering phones; and eventually becoming a role model. In order to advance to intern, he had to have his GED and he studied sporadically in my school to take the test.

Randall is bright and he worked hard, passing the pre-GED in all five subjects. I recommended he be funded by the program to take the test, and he registered for for it. The morning of his test I saw him smoking out in front of the rehab. He told me he went to the testing center but was the only one who showed up, so they rescheduled the math and writing for next week. The odd thing is I believed him. After ten years working with parolees I somehow didn’t have my “cheater meter” up and running. Two days later coming in to work I saw his name on the board that lists the names of residents who split or were kicked out. Randall had left in the middle of the night. I called the GED testing center and they told me they’d had a full house for that week’s math and writing exam. Damn. My heart dropped.

It’s common for prisoners to mess up right before their release or to work toward a goal and sabotage it. They say success is the hardest thing for this population. Increased expectations, increased responsibility, increased fear. About the same time Randall left, most likely relapsing on heroin, I received a new student, Geraldo. Geraldo scored 100% on four of the five pre-GED tests. This is unprecedented in my experience. I immediately recommended him for the full test and he is set to take the GED next month. this time I’m not keeping my fingers crossed. Geraldo exceeds my expectations and I have no fear that he will succeed.

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77, but who’s counting?

December 30, 2010

Yesterday marked one year since I started Parole Call. My goal was 100 posts; counting this one I wrote 77. Anniversaries are funny things in my line of work. Mostly everything my students — all felons on parole — recognize as a milestone is followed by the statement, on the outside. “This is the first birthday/Christmas/Thanksgiving I’ve spent on the outside in X many years.” I’ve never heard anyone say, “This is the first anniversary of my not stealing.” Maybe we should honor the passage of time from iniquity as well.

So this is my first anniversary of blogging. I have learned a lot about my work through this process of written reflection. I realize I spend all day helping people see their potential, celebrate small victories, and recognize incremental growth in themselves. But I also see humanity in turmoil, locked into destructive patterns, unable to break away from drugs, poverty, and the grip of mental illness. My work environment is never boring. On any given day when I walk into the greater rehab, there is likely someone yelling, getting yelled at, crying, laughing, ready to walk, steaming mad, or heartbroken. I see people in survival mode, working the system for food and shelter. Some students leave without completing the program and come back years later, fresh out of prison all over again. I might see a former student sitting on the couch near the intake desk, black-eyed, thin and homeless. “Welcome back,” I say. “I hope you will come back to school, we missed you.” It’s about a thimble of hope.

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School supplies

November 12, 2010

 

One of my former students returned this week. Bart was in my class in 2008. I remember him getting close to taking his GED right before taking off. Everyone likes Bart. Barely out of his twenties, he makes eccentricity seem cool right down to his blond mohawk that turns into a long pony tail. Since I last saw him Bart has been working on expanding the holes pierced in his ears. Yesterday he walked in with two AA batteries in each lobe.  “Have a look in your junk drawer, Ms. P, ” he said. He wanted me to find him something else to put in the holes now stretched to nearly an inch in diameter.  “Inside I used chess pieces,” he said of his time in prison. “Queens because the kings were too big.”

I try to withhold even the simplest supply request lest word get out in the community that I am soft and can be milked for goods. I never let parolees use my office phone or borrow money, not even a quarter. If you give an inmate a paper clip in prison you can lose your job. It’s a matter of safety and security. Here are some items I did give out this week: pencils to do math problems, an envelope to send for official GED transcripts, a rubber band to hold together a student’s dreadlocks so they don’t fall in his eyes during computer work.

Stuffing your ears with batteries can’t be good. So I found a dried-out orange highlighter in my desk and gave it to Bart. The next day he came in to class with the highlighter’s plastic orange barrel neatly cut into fat, hollow pegs that he proudly wore in each earlobe. Then he watched a skateboard video on Microsoft Encarta. I saw it was too late to ask for my highlighter back.

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Jump in

October 31, 2010

Every day my work brings sweet surprises. I rely on volunteer tutors to help my students. They tutor in the classroom and sometimes outside of class, so students get  all the benefits of a private boarding school in parole housing. I’ve had many tutors over the years and most of them have been amazing.  One of my class tutors came back to say hi. She had one of my former students with her and they had news — they are now engaged and living together. They seemed stable, found jobs, were saving for a car. Though it is highly discouraged during recovery, relationships are formed in rehab, even here in my little one-room schoolhouse.

I recently lost my volunteer math tutor and found a new one in the community. A recovering cocaine addict, Khadim was raised in West Africa, speaks fluent French, Spanish and Yoruba. He went to universities in Africa and New York and has a degree in economics. He leaves early on Friday mornings to attend a Mosque dressed in beautiful African attire. He is over a foot taller than I. Very quiet, he waits for students to ask for his help. “Jump in,” I tell him, or I just call out his name, “Khadim!” Once he sits down and gets started, he’s one of the loudest people in the room, and I have to remind him, “Use your whispering voice.”

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