Correctional Service Canada
www.csc-scc.gc.ca
Common menu bar links
FORUM on Corrections Research
Staff Development and the Formation of Curriculum in Prison Education
|
This essay highlights the importance of curriculum development to everyday educational practice. It
suggests that prison education would be well served if teachers and students were more involved in the
formation of curriculum. One way to facilitate more involvement would be to include curriculum formation
as a central feature of staff development. The process would also involve identifying pedagogical
strategies to incorporate students' input. An initiative of this kind is needed to enhance the
professional status of prison educators and to bring greater relevance to the curriculum. Contemporary
Curriculum Formats In the field of adult education, there is a growing concern about the reliance on
prepackaged, modular curriculum formats. There is also concern about the prevalence of prescriptive
curriculum guides, which are intended to direct teaching and learning from outside the classroom. These
prepackaged formats and prescriptive curriculum guides have a definite appeal for management and provide
a source of security for less able teachers. Even well-qualified teachers are attracted to prepackaged
curriculum modules, as exemplified by the ubiquitous competency-based education approach, because they
apparently reduce the need for careful class preparation. Moreover, prepackaged curriculum formats are
very conducive to keeping students busily occupied. Mere busyness, however, is not the same thing as
meaningful engagement. The reliance on technocratic, prepackaged curriculum designs is highly problematic. They are not at all conducive to improving the performance of learners and teachers, especially when these formats are allowed to shape the educational process.(1) The increased use of modular, prepackaged curriculum cannot be linked with better performance in writing, reading, and numeracy by students, nor with improved educational practice by teachers. In fact, the growing trend toward prepackaged formats and prescriptive curriculums has been accompanied by increased complaints about falling educational standards and teacher performance. Lawrence Cremin, an eminent educational researcher and former president of the prestigious Columbia Teachers College, asserted that prevalent prepackaged approaches such as competency-based education were harmful.(2) Prepackaged curriculum formats are full of references to skills (study skills, coping skills, teaching skills, aesthetic skills, life skills, and so on). For the designers of these prepackaged formats, all human endeavour can apparently be reduced to skills. However, when prepackaged curriculum formats are allowed to shape -or take over - the educational process, teachers and learners alike are actually deskilled in a very profound way. For example, the ethos of competency-based education presupposes a state of permanent inadequacy in adults as learners. Teachers surrender their pedagogical roles to become "facilitators," "managers" or even "executive officers" for the deployment of prepackaged standardized curriculum. Ultimately, teachers become dispensable because of the justifiable notion that no special capacities are needed to merely administer prepackaged curriculums. If we are serious about the importance of teaching as a vocation and the need for students to read, write, calculate, and think critically, then teachers must gain more control of the curriculum development process within their own institutions. A useful start would be to include genuinely participatory approaches to curriculum formation as a focus for ongoing professional staff development.(3) The Prison Setting Usually, curriculum is handed down in a static package from the top to teachers, who are left to decide how to make it work. Many teachers want to be part of the curriculum development process. However, past experiences have shown curriculums developed by teachers to be personally biased and poorly targeted. Moreover, some of those involved in the process have not been committed to effecting real change. In such circumstances, curriculum development at the grassroots level has been curtailed, and curriculum initiatives continue to come from management. If curriculum development in the prison setting is to become a more participatory and dynamic process, a number of questions must be addressed. For example:
Some orientation at the beginning of their employment helps teachers understand the required security routines. From the outset, they have to know the procedures for inmate movement within the institution and the rules about staff-inmate interactions. For the most part, however, staff orientation is limited to less useful on-the-job training, with undue focus on the communication of procedural requirements. Once assigned to the school area, teachers are isolated from their professional peers by virtue of the fact that they are teaching in a prison. Responding on a day-to-day basis to the psychological needs and security concerns of inmates in educational programs keeps prison educators occupied and allows little time for careful reflection on the relevance of curriculum and the nature of their professional practice. This professional isolation and almost total preoccupation with the pressing needs of a prison environment point to the need for organized staff development if curriculum is to be relevantly designed. While many educational programs within the Correctional Service of Canada are provided by outside agencies, it has not been realistic to expect these agencies to provide adequate staff development. Their priorities often do not coincide with those of the prison setting, and the agencies are not always committed to facilitating staff development, even for their teachers who work on the outside. Nor have universities and postsecondary institutions played a significant role in staff development - simply because they do not have sufficient economic returns and other incentives to help with staff development in the prisons on a systematic basis. Some prison educators belong to professional groups, such as provincial teachers' federations, which provide staff development for their members. But, as they always constitute a minority interest, prison educators are unable to significantly influence the agenda of the larger group. One institutional response to the need for professional interaction within the Correctional Service of Canada is the Monthly Divisional Meeting. All too often, however, the meeting is steered by one-way discourse designed to impart information about control within the institution. While some of the briefings are important, they tend to foster further isolation and encourage teachers to operate within a "comfort zone." Pedagogy within the "comfort zone" is rarely creative and not at all conducive to teacher participation in curriculum development. Nevertheless, the Correctional Service of Canada has devised some relevant responses to these problems at the national, regional and institutional levels. At the national level, the Correctional Service of Canada's Mission Statement acknowledges the need to develop the professional capacities of prison staff. Educational leave without pay is encouraged, and staff are now entitled to five days' paid training a year. Funding is also available for staff to attend correctional education conferences. In 1982, teachers and management in the Prairie region co-operated to form the Correctional Educators Association, which serves prison educators from both the federal and provincial jurisdictions. This initiative was undertaken in conjunction with colleagues from the University of Saskatchewan and the Saskatchewan Institute of Applied Sciences and Technology - Woodlands Campus (formerly Natonum Community College) who were involved in prison education. Every year, the Association organizes a four-day residential education workshop at Emma Lake, Saskatchewan, to provide a forum for teachers from federal, provincial, and young-offender institutions to examine significant educational issues away from the distracting pressures of prison life. In 1987, a curriculum for adult basic education was developed through a joint project involving representatives from the Correctional Service of Canada, the University of Saskatchewan, and the departments of education of the three prairie provinces. The process was designed to allow the teachers and administrators involved an opportunity to view the task from a number of perspectives. The guidelines that emerged showed how current requirements for standardization could be sensibly met while permitting flexibility for creative teaching and further curriculum design at institutional levels. More importantly, the guidelines highlighted the potential for ongoing staff development with participatory approaches to curriculum formation. This potential has yet to be realized. As for the Monthly Divisional Meetings, there are encouraging signs that they could become a significant forum for dealing more substantively with educational concerns. At Saskatchewan Penitentiary, for example, the meetings are supplemented by discussions on issues and recent trends in correctional education. Most institutions have libraries that contain instructional materials and literature relevant to professional staff development. Their potential as a source for staff development depends, of course, upon the willingness of teachers to use them and to keep the collection current. While educators in prisons recognize the need for organized staff development, they often fail to understand its significance for curriculum design, program development, and teacher-initiated program evaluation. Their attitude is understandable, as many prison educators have experienced staff development as a fixed regimen of activities organized from outside the classroom and institutional setting and thus lacking relevance. With their recognition of the problems stemming from professional isolation, however, teachers themselves must assume some responsibility for their own staff development and take back some ownership of the curriculum. As a result, prison educators will be more successful in gaining the respect of their students. The role of management should be to foster this process. In his presentation at the Fourth World Assembly of Adult Educators (January 1990, Bangkok), the Canadian representative, J.W. Cosman, had this to say about prison education: Education in prisons is really very sad story. Generally speaking, it is very limited in range and very poor in quality. There are exceptions of course, but not very many. Most prison education is not worth writing home about.(4) Subsequently, the Eighth United Nations Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders(5) adopted a number of resolutions. The Resolution on Prison Education included a statement that emphasized the need for educators' and staff training. While the situation in Canada may be better than in many other countries, it is still "not worth writing home about." There is no room for complacency. (1)Collins, M. (1987). Competence in Adult Education: A New Perspective. Washington, D.C.: University Press of America. (2)Kevin, R. (1978). "An Interview with Lawrence A. Cremin," Phi Delta Kappan, October, 115. (3)Fingeret, A., & Jurmo, P. (1989). Participatory Literacy Education. San Francisco & London: Jossey-Bass. (4)Cosman, J. (1990). "Why Not Education in Prisons?" Notes for Discussion at the Fourth World Assembly of Adult Education, p.1. Bangkok. (5)U.N. Congress on the Prevention of Crime and the Treatment of Offenders (1990). Resolutions on Prison Education - Appendix C, Recommendation 1. |
