<story><title>From Prison to Programming</title><url>https://corecursive.com/prison-programming-with-rick-wolter/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>lostboomerang</author><text>Rick Wolter seems to be quite balanced. Read the last paragraph &amp;quot;Life’s Not Fair&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;Problem is that some people read his story and thinks. &amp;quot;Oh, so teaching felons programming is a great way to reduce recidivism&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;This kind of be-all-end-all solution always fails. Some years ago journalists in the US loved to tell coal miners that they should &amp;quot;learn to code&amp;quot; when the mines shut down due to Washington politics. How hard could it be?&lt;p&gt;When media corporations started laying off journalists in droves a few years later, the journalists did not find &amp;quot;Learn to code&amp;quot; suggestions useful or even funny.&lt;p&gt;A more general solution to reduce recidivism should probably consist of two initiatives:&lt;p&gt;1) Educate felons when they&amp;#x27;re in prison. It doesn&amp;#x27;t have to be programming. It can be a craft, something academic, programming (if they feel like it) or some other skill. Whatever.&lt;p&gt;2) Reform the prison system, so inmates are treated as humans. E.g. with private corporations running prisons in the US, they have a strong motivation to create &amp;quot;recurring guests&amp;quot;. Contrast this with e.g. prisons in Scandinavia (&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.youtube.com&amp;#x2F;watch?v=0IepJqxRCZY&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.youtube.com&amp;#x2F;watch?v=0IepJqxRCZY&lt;/a&gt;) that have the lowest rates of recidivism.&lt;p&gt;We know how to reduce recidivism. It is not an easy &amp;quot;learn to code&amp;quot; exercise. But are the US willing to make the changes necessary to create meaningful impact on the rates of recidivism - or shall we continue to be fed &amp;quot;pull yourself up by the bootstraps! We found one guy who did it, and so can you!&amp;quot; stories?</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>satysin</author><text>God I fucking &lt;i&gt;hate&lt;/i&gt; the response &amp;quot;learn to code!&amp;quot; to everything.&lt;p&gt;People seem to think everyone being a programmer is needed otherwise humanity will fall. Honestly it is one of the stupidest things I have heard.&lt;p&gt;Could more [good] programmers be a good thing? Sure, we can always do with more good programmers.&lt;p&gt;However the truth is we need more of many, many types of people. Teachers, personal care workers, doctors, nurses, etc.&lt;p&gt;Not everyone &lt;i&gt;wants&lt;/i&gt; to be a programming. Not everyone &lt;i&gt;can&lt;/i&gt; be a programmer.&lt;p&gt;Can I teach anyone to write Hello World or a simple number game in Python? Of course, same way I can teacher anyone to track their budget in a basic Excel file.&lt;p&gt;But I can&amp;#x27;t take &lt;i&gt;anyone&lt;/i&gt; and teach them Excel to be a spreadsheet wizard for the finance department. Believe me I know this from first hand experience :)&lt;p&gt;What we need is an open, fair and &lt;i&gt;free&lt;/i&gt; education system to encourage people of [almost] all ages to do what they are good at and enjoy. We put far too much positive spin on learning to code as if it is the answer to every god damn problem in the world.</text></comment>
<story><title>From Prison to Programming</title><url>https://corecursive.com/prison-programming-with-rick-wolter/</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>lostboomerang</author><text>Rick Wolter seems to be quite balanced. Read the last paragraph &amp;quot;Life’s Not Fair&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;Problem is that some people read his story and thinks. &amp;quot;Oh, so teaching felons programming is a great way to reduce recidivism&amp;quot;.&lt;p&gt;This kind of be-all-end-all solution always fails. Some years ago journalists in the US loved to tell coal miners that they should &amp;quot;learn to code&amp;quot; when the mines shut down due to Washington politics. How hard could it be?&lt;p&gt;When media corporations started laying off journalists in droves a few years later, the journalists did not find &amp;quot;Learn to code&amp;quot; suggestions useful or even funny.&lt;p&gt;A more general solution to reduce recidivism should probably consist of two initiatives:&lt;p&gt;1) Educate felons when they&amp;#x27;re in prison. It doesn&amp;#x27;t have to be programming. It can be a craft, something academic, programming (if they feel like it) or some other skill. Whatever.&lt;p&gt;2) Reform the prison system, so inmates are treated as humans. E.g. with private corporations running prisons in the US, they have a strong motivation to create &amp;quot;recurring guests&amp;quot;. Contrast this with e.g. prisons in Scandinavia (&lt;a href=&quot;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.youtube.com&amp;#x2F;watch?v=0IepJqxRCZY&quot; rel=&quot;nofollow&quot;&gt;https:&amp;#x2F;&amp;#x2F;www.youtube.com&amp;#x2F;watch?v=0IepJqxRCZY&lt;/a&gt;) that have the lowest rates of recidivism.&lt;p&gt;We know how to reduce recidivism. It is not an easy &amp;quot;learn to code&amp;quot; exercise. But are the US willing to make the changes necessary to create meaningful impact on the rates of recidivism - or shall we continue to be fed &amp;quot;pull yourself up by the bootstraps! We found one guy who did it, and so can you!&amp;quot; stories?</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>KBeyo</author><text>I work with people in prison, or as they are commonly referred to within some circles, justice involved individuals.&lt;p&gt;The issue here is not skilling these people in trades, it’s really about working on mental health and the underlying reasons why they are in prison. Until those challenges are addressed, these people mostly will not succeed. Many have not experienced much of a « normal » family life or friendships that promote personal growth, or mentorship.&lt;p&gt;On top of that, when many are released they have nothing. So, imagine trying to stay employed for a week when you have nowhere to live (especially hard to rent a place also when you have a record[1].&lt;p&gt;Anyway, we might know how to reduce recidivism, but society sure doesn’t seem interested in taking the steps to invest what’s needed.&lt;p&gt;[1] I recently spoke in front of the Colorado Senate concerning Assembly Bill 99 which will auto-erase the records of non-violent offenders in the state with some outcomes being that they can more easily find employment and rent places to live.</text></comment>