Public Humanities Initiative Justice-in-Education Initiative Workshop: Teaching in Prison

TORONTO, ONTARIO: MARCH 8, 2013 – at Toronto Jail in Toronto, Ontario, March 8, 2013. (Tyler Anderson/National Post) (For Toronto story by Megan O’Toole) //NATIONAL POST STAFF PHOTO

Public Humanities Initiative

Justice-in-Education Initiative Workshop: Teaching in Prison

Thursday, December 10, 2015  12:15PM

The Heyman Center, Common Room

This teaching workshop brings together faculty, graduate students, administrators and community members interested in teaching in prison and in prison education programs. Speakers discuss the classes and programs they lead and share their experiences engaging in prison education. A question and answer period will follow their presentations.

Speakers

Susan Castagnetto: Coordinator for Intercollegiate Women’s Studies of The Claremont Colleges and a Lecturer in Philosophy at Scripps College.

Sean Pica: Executive Director of Hudson Link

Mary (Molly) Shanley: Professor of Political Science at Vassar College

Moderator

Michelle Fine: Distinguished Professor at The Graduate Center, City University of New York

This event is open to Columbia faculty and graduate students interested in prison education and invited guests.

About the Justice-in-Education Initiative

The Justice-in-Education Initiative is a collaboration between the Heyman Center for the Humanities and the Center for Justice at Columbia University, along with the Media and Idea Lab of the Center for the Study of Ethnicity and Race, to provide educational opportunities to incarcerated and formerly incarcerated persons and to integrate further the study of justice into the Columbia University curriculum. The Initiative offers courses, taught by Columbia instructors, in local prisons and provides those who have come home from prison with the opportunity to continue their education at Columbia and its partner institutions.

Notes

Open to Columbia community and invited guests

Photo ID required for entry

Sponsors

Heyman Center Public Humanities Initiative

Center for Justice at Columbia University

About the Participants

Susan Castagnetto, Coordinator, Intercollegiate Women’s Studies of The Claremont Colleges, Lecturer in Philosophy, Scripps College

Susan Castagnetto is the Coordinator for Intercollegiate Women’s Studies of The Claremont Colleges and a Lecturer in Philosophy at Scripps College. She authored a Best Practices Report on Centers for Homeless Women, in conjunction with the Downtown Women’s Center, Los Angeles. Susan is the regional co-coordinator for the “Get on the Bus” project, to provide prison visits for children of incarcerated mothers in California. She works with the Women & Criminal Justice network, using lobbying and other political means to transform practices in the criminal justice system for incarcerated women. Her research is on feminist adoption issues and activism. She received her B.A. from the University of Santa Clara (1976) and Ph.D. from Stanford University (1986).

Sean Pica, Executive Director, Hudson Link

Reporting to the Hudson Link Board of Directors, Sean Pica has overall strategic and operational responsibility for staff, programs, development, expansion and execution of Hudson Link’s mission. Mr. Pica joined Hudson Link’s Board of Directors in 2004 and in 2007 left the Board to become the Executive Director for the organization.  Under Sean’s leadership, Hudson Link has grown from a 65 person college program operating inside one prison, Sing Sing Correctional Facility, to approximately 250 students enrolled in college programs at 4 New York State correctional facilities. “My hope, when I took over as Hudson Link’s Executive Director, was to positively affect as many lives as possible through higher education, both inside and outside the prison walls. Transformation is about the ripple effect on the prison community, the students families and the communities they return to.” Prior to joining Hudson Link, Mr. Pica was the Director of Club Access, a psychosocial clubhouse for adults with mental health disabilities, and a tenant advocate for the James Weldon Housing Projects in East Harlem. Mr. Pica serves as a Senior Fellow with Mercy College’s Center for Social and Criminal Justice, on the Service Providers Advisory Committee (SPAC) which collaborates on policy issues in the NYS Department of Corrections, on the Boards of Career Gear and Saving Our Society and as a facilitator for STRIVE Fatherhood Programs. Mr. Pica earned his Bachelor’s degree in Organizational Management from Nyack College, his Master’s degree in Professional Studies from the New York Theological Seminary, his Master’s degree in Social Work from Hunter College, and is currently an MBA student at Mercy College.

Mary Shanley, Professor of Political Science on the Margaret Stiles Halleck Chair, Vassar College

Mary Lyndon (Molly) Shanley is Professor of Political Science on the Margaret Stiles Halleck Chair at Vassar College. She teaches courses in political theory; gender, politics and law; and bioethics and human reproduction. Ms. Shanley is author of Feminism, Marriage and the Law in Victorian England (Princeton, 1989), Making Babies, Making Families: What Matters Most in an Age of Reproductive Technologies, Surrogacy, Adoption, and Same-Sex and Unwed Parents (Beacon, 2001), and Just Marriage, ed. Deborah Chasman and Joshua Cohen (Oxford University Press, 2004).  She is editor, with Carole Pateman, of Feminist Interpretations and Political Theory (Penn State University Press, 1990), with Uma Narayan, ofReconstructing Political Theory:  Feminist Essays (Penn State University Press, 1997), and with Iris Marion Young and Daniel I. O’Neill, Illusion of Consent: Engaging with Carole Pateman (Penn State, forthcoming). Her articles and reviews have appeared in such journals as Political Theory, Signs, Victorian Studies, Hypatia, and the Columbia Law Review. Her current work is on feminist perspectives on social justice issues in family formation, and on bioethics and human reproduction. In her local community, Ms. Shanley has been active in groups developing services for battered women, and she teaches a writing course to women in the Dutchess County Jail. Ms. Shanley served as chair of the American Political Science Association’s Committee on the Status of Women and as President of the Women’s Caucus for Political Science.

Michelle Fine, Distinguished Professor, The Graduate Center, City University of New York

Fine is Professor in the PhD Program in Psychology at the CUNY Graduate Center. A social psychologist, her primary research interest is the study of social injustice: when injustice is perceived or appears simply fair or deserved, when it is resisted, and how it is negotiated by those who pay the most serious price for social inequities. She studies these issues in her work with public high schools, prisons, and youth in urban communities, using both qualitative and quantitative methods. Her research is typically participatory, with youth and/or activists, drawing from feminist, critical race, and other critical theories. She is the author, most recently, of The Unknown City: Lives of Poor and Working Class Young Adults (1998), Speedbumps: A Student-riendly Guide to Qualitative Research (2000), and Construction Sites: Excavating Race, Class, Gender & Sexuality in Spaces for and by Youth (2000), all co-authored with L. Weis. Professor Fine received her PhD in Social Psychology from Teachers College of Columbia University in 1980.