I started working with inmates way back during college. I've done a few things since, and 25 years have gone past, but I've recently reentered the alternate reality of state-controlled criminal justice centers and want to share out some of my experiences. So that's what this blog is gonna be about...

I've been teaching a graphic novel course to inmates this fall. I'm an English teacher with 15 years of classroom experience; my colleague and co-teacher is a local artist. We walk in, check in, lock up our valuables, go through screening, then get shuttled through and around the jail until we arrive in a small classroom about 1/2 an hour later. There, we sit down with 6-10 male inmates, ages 19-65, and open up books, have conversations, discuss stuff, laugh, write and draw.

We wrap up 90 minutes later, say goodbye, shake a few hands, pump a few fists, then get shuttled back to an office for a break before the women's class begins.

Another program coordinator picks us up in the lunch room and then shuttles us to a different class-- smaller-- for our second class. 4-6 women join us, and we launch back into a similar class, but due to the gender make-up it's quite a bit different. Same routine, though, including some or all of the following: discussing the book we're reading, learning vocab, discussing history, politics, and current events, writing in silence for a spell, sharing out, laughing, then drawing, sharing out some more, discussing the homework, signing point-sheets (for the women-- doesn't apply to men), then saying goodbye and waiting to be shuttled out.

Then we check out, turn in our badges, gather our stuff, step back outside, look across to the foothills or up at the blue sky, breathe, step into our cars and go home. Which of course the inmates aren't free to do...

So, the purpose of this blog? To share some of the day-to-day, as well as some of the writing. Some of the laughs, ups and downs.

The books, in case you're wondering: Yummy--the Last Days of a Southside Shorty (Tupac wrote a song about him as well), Stargazing Dog, The Silence of our Friends, Ghostopolis, El Deafo, and Maus. Four of the six are pretty heavy books, sometimes the inmates ask why we chose such heavy stuff to read...

Anyways, we're headed into week six of round two-- wrapping things up with the men's group, continuing with the same group of women due to their high turn-over rate. And, I'm hoping to start two new groups-- one based on the column "Readers Write" in the Sun Magazine, the other something else-- chi kung and tai chi. Stay tuned for more on these...

-Toby