Category of Work
Presentation
Title of Conference/Lecture Series
American Sociological Association Annual Meeting 2025
Abstract
Under the recently expanded Second Chance Pell Initiative, an increasing number of individuals under carceral control in the United States can enroll in higher education programs with Pell grant funding. In 2022, Lewis University, a mid-sized teaching institution in suburban Chicago, became the second ‘Second Chance Pell Experimental Site' in Illinois and began offering undergraduate degrees to people incarcerated in the Illinois Department of Corrections system. Lewis’ program is especially innovative in that faculty members partner with incarcerated teaching fellows, all of whom earned Master of Arts degrees while incarcerated. This partnership entails deeply intentionally and fully collaborative course development and delivery. The teaching fellows are not only co-instructors but also provide tutoring and other forms of academic support. In this interactive workshop, presenters who include four teaching fellows who are currently incarcerated in the Sheridan Correctional Center, a prison education program director, and a full-time sociology professor, focus on the co-creation and co-teaching of sociology courses in carceral settings based on our shared experiences as part of the Lewis University Prison Education Program. Participants of this workshop will have opportunities to learn in community and engage in conversation around the many challenges and possibilities of creative pedagogical practices within sociology classrooms, both inside and outside of carceral spaces. This workshop focuses in particular on curriculum development and will be of particular value to those interested in prison education programs, those teaching sociology courses to those under various forms of carceral control, and any of those who find themselves negotiating multiple bureaucracies in their teaching, as well as those interested in teaching in nontraditional spaces and those interested in developing and delivering sociology courses with those who did not travel traditionally expected paths to teaching within the discipline.
Presentation Date
Summer 8-11-2025
Recommended Citation
Allen, Tennille Nicole; Clifton, Michelle; Moore, Scott; Negrón, Alex; Simmons, Michael; and Terrell, Devon, "Teaching Inside: Pedagogical Strategies and Innovations Within Carceral Settings" (2025). Sociology Department Faculty Conferences. 1.
https://digitalcommons.lewisu.edu/sociology_faccons/1
