|
|||||||||||||
Printer-Friendly
Email this Story
Post a Comment (0)
A second chance
The 19 graduates trickled in from their cell blocks and put on their crimson graduation robes over their detention center jumpsuits.There was no commencement speech, except the brief remarks by prison officials telling the inmates that, with their General Educational Development (GED) diploma, they had a chance to start over.
With tears in his eyes, David Carter of Takoma Park, Md., took his diploma out from its white paper envelope. Almost in disbelief he put the diploma back and then pulled it out again moments later.
"It's a start for a new beginning," Carter said. "Anything is possible. For years I never thought I'd get this piece of paper."
Carter, 44, dropped out of high school in the 11th grade and has spent a good chunk of his life in area jails.
A father of three children, Carter is afraid he will negatively influence his 12-year-old son, who idolizes him.
"I never successfully done nothin' in my life ... It's hard to concentrate on school when you got to concentrate on making sure you can find somewhere to sleep, eat and daily life things," Carter said.
After his arrest, Carter called his mother on a pay phone.
"My mother said to me, 'You're going to end up like your sister, or worse. See, at least she died on the street with her family around her.' The worst thing I can ever think about is me dying in a jail cell."
Most of the 1,300 inmates at the Fairfax County Adult Detention Center spend their days sleeping in the cell block and watching television, prohibited from returning to their individual cells until the early evening. Long periods of time are spent with little to do.
The jail's GED program is voluntary and can only hold 20 students at a time. The waiting list is short, and it takes inmates a few weeks since a 10th of the prison population choose to enter into adult education programs.
The program operates under the umbrella of the county school system's Adult and Community Education program. Roughly 75 county inmates receive their high school diplomas every year.
"Once you come in and get involved with the students, then you only see them as people who really want to improve their lives. You don't see them as someone who's done something bad on the outside," said program director Alice Holman.
Most student inmates, like Antoine Smith, 19, want to use their diploma to get into a trade. Smith, of Alexandria, wants to be a plumber because he heard they make good money, but "You can't do nothin' without the paper, the diploma," Smith said.
Many students take the position of inmate Arthur Miller, a 56-year-old Vietnam veteran with post traumatic stress disorder who was imprisoned after throwing a bottle at a person's head last fall.
Miller thought to himself, "I'm here and the door [is] open for me. ... I'm not just going to sit here and lay up, you know, because of my age. I'm not dead and you're never too old to learn."
After his release, Miller will go to Baltimore to live in a residential program for people with PTSD. Without the detention center, Miller said, he never would have gotten his GED.
Out on the streets "there is so much distraction. You don't have time to think about something like that," Miller said.
Maj. James Whitley said the GED program is meant to reverse recidivism.
"We want [inmates] when they go out to be better prepared to better handle their life."
There was no cap throwing, however. The caps and gowns would be reused for the following graduating class.
Still teary-eyed, Carter said, "I'm looking forward from here."
The students ate lunch with cake and soda, talked with their teachers and peers and then were quietly escorted back to their cell block.
You must be logged in to post a comment.