Last night I taught my final class, if one could refer to what I've done for the past 13 weeks as teaching. I started out with over 25 inmates and last night I had 9, a pretty big attrition rate. I did the first 8 weeks of my course concentrating on skills to help get a job. Resume writing, cover letters, interviewing and networking. I had a well prepared agenda and course notes for each class and I passed along some valuable information culled from my 45+ years of business and HR experience, I took the course very seriously and I think I conveyed that to the guys who came in. The remaining 5 weeks I tried to focus on creative writing, giving ideas on how to get started, what to do, how to reach out for help and a ton if info culled from writers speaking about writing. My course notes for this section I felt were very strong, drawing on books on writing by Stephen King and the Gotham Writers Workbook.
Here's what i found, while the guys were interested I could not get them to do any work outside of the class, Not one did a real resume, write a real cover letter or a short story. I was disappointed, because these skills I offered to teach them were real world skills they would need when they get out. I think the primary reason for them taking my course or any other was to kill time, perhaps some wanted to get something out of it and they stuck with the course from beginning to end. There is a definite lack of training of any sort being done by the BOP for when people get out and this is a crime. Help the inmates help themselves achieve something tangible for when they leave, so they wont be back,
