Tag: prison education

Shirley Hoogstra on God’s Economy

The most recent episode of NetVUE’s podcast Callings features hosts Erin VanLaningham and John Barton speaking with Shirley Hoogstra.

The most recent episode of NetVUE’s podcast Callings features hosts Erin VanLaningham and John Barton speaking with Shirley Hoogstra. Shirley has been an elementary school teacher, a litigator, a vice president for student life at Calvin University and, since 2014, the president of the Council for Christian Colleges & Universities (CCCU).

With her belief that there is “nothing wasted in God’s economy,” she encourages us to look for vocational possibilities both by taking heed of our own feelings of “restlessness” and by listening to others. Within classrooms, we can prepare students for multiple vocations and for facing difficult problems and contentious spaces by cultivating in them a “deep moral courage.”

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Second Chances and Good Time(s): Transformations and Transactions in Prison

What if we thought of education as a gift that is not contingent on the worthiness of its recipient yet that still inspires recipients to pay the gift forward with lives that serve the common good?

APEP faculty greeting student David Staples upon his release after serving 29 years for a crime he didn’t commit (Jason Mahn, center)

Three weeks ago, I submitted final grades for the January (J-Term) course that I taught at East Moline Correctional Center (EMCC) through the Augustana Prison Education Program (APEP).  I created the course, “Redemption, Reconciliation, and Restorative Justice,” on the “inside-out” model of prison education. The plan was to shuttle traditional students each day to the local prison to learn beside their incarcerated classmates. Sadly, EMCC nixed that plan earlier in the fall, citing a shortage of security personnel. When Sharon Varallo, the executive director of APEP, asked me to choose whether to teach the course to free students or incarcerated students, I quickly chose the latter. I knew from some prior experiences that deep transformation of individuals and communities is more likely—or at least easier to notice—when teaching behind bars.

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