After deciding to teach in a jail, Jen Hurley learned a great deal from her students.
I’ve been wanting to write about what it’s like to teach college English to students in jail, but I’m worried that when people find out what I have to say, everyone might want to teach in jail—and I could be pushed out as the competition surges.
My first day at the jail, I sat in my car before class, meditating my brains out, as if a mantra had any chance of easing my nerves. To reach the dorm where I taught my class, I walked along a half mile of barbed wire fencing and passed through nine locked gates.
In the room, I gave out a reading and began to read out loud. Before I’d even finished the page, hands flew up around the room. My students had questions and opinions. Their minds were alive in a way that was new to me, even after 23 years of teaching.
Throughout the semester, my students continued to surprise me. When I asked them to keep a diary every day, not only did they do it, but they gave me their diaries to read. When I asked them to write about their lives, many of them produced 10, 15, even 20 pages. In class, they wanted to read their work out loud. One day, a heavily tattooed man stood in front of the class and told his story, fighting back tears the whole time, and I knew that this was the most humbling experience of my life.