Posted by request from David J. Rosen
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Dear Colleagues,

Beginning today, on the Special Topics Discussion List, we are pleased
to have a panel of expert guests in corrections education.  
The topic will focus on research and professional wisdom in corrections
family literacy, and on the transition from corrections education to
community education for inmates who have been released.

Our guests are:

John Linton, Correctional Education, Office of Safe and Drug Free
Schools, U.S. Department of Education

John is the program officer for two correctional education grant
programs ("Lifeskills for State and Local Prisoners" and "Grants to
States for Workplace and Community Transition Training for Incarcerated
Youth Offenders") in the Office of Safe and Drug Free Schools of the U.
S. Department of Education.  John formerly served the State of Maryland
as the director of adult correctional education programs.  He has been
with the federal agency since 2001, originally with the Office of
Vocational and Adult Education.

Stephen J. Steurer, Ph.D., Executive Director, Correctional Education
Association. The Correctional Education Association is a professional
organization of educators who work in prisons, jails and juvenile
settings.

William R. Muth, PhD, Assistant Professor, Reading Education and Adult
Literacy, Virginia Commonwealth University

Bill is an Assistant Professor of Adult and Adolescent Literacy at
Virginia Commonwealth University. Until August 2005, he was the
Education Administrator for the Federal Bureau of Prisons. Other
positions with the FBOP included: reading teacher, principal, and Chief
of the Program Analysis Branch. In 2004 Bill earned his doctorate in
adult literacy from George Mason University. His dissertation,
"Performance and Perspective: Two Assessments of Federal Prisoners in
Literacy Programs" won the College Reading Association's Dissertation of
the Year Award. His research interests include Thirdspace and Reading
Components theories, especially as these apply to prison-based family
literacy programs and children of incarcerated parents.

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The following readings are recommended by the panelists as background
for the discussion:

1. "Locked Up and Locked Out, An Educational Perspective on the US
Prison Population," Coley, Richard J. and Barton, Paul E., 2006
Available on line at the ETS web site:

http://tinyurl.com/qmzfa (short URL)

2. "Learning to Reduce Recidivism: A 50-state analysis of postsecondary
correctional education policy," Institute for Higher Education Policy,
Erisman, Wendy and Contardo, Jeanne B., 2005.  
Available on line at the IHEP web site:

http://tinyurl.com/pj2sh (short URL)

3. "Understanding California Corrections" from the California Policy
Research Center, U of C. (Chapter 4)
http://www.ucop.edu/cprc/documents/understand_ca_corrections.pdf

John Linton believes that California is a watershed state in corrections
issues and policies , and that how things unfold there has great
national significance.  He says that this is a thoughtful and
well-informed report on the "overview" of the corrections situation in
California -- including the role of treatment programs.
Education is not presented as a central issue, but it has a place -- as
a piece of a bigger puzzle.

4. An article by Bill Muth in Exploring Adult Literacy can be found at

http://literacy.kent.edu/cra/2006/wmuth/index.html

The article contains other on-line links related to prison-based
intergenerational programs. He recommends especially the link to the
Hudson River Center's excellent publication, Bringing Family Literacy to
Incarcerated Settings: An Instructional Guide at:

http://www.hudrivctr.org/products_ce.htm

David J. Rosen
Special Topics Discussion Moderator
djrosen at comcast.net