On November 12th, our group ended up at the Cayuga Community College for the day. We had decided to go there because one of our group members had found online that they were having a veterans day program at the college and considering the strong military presence we had seen/felt in the town, we thought it might be useful for our research. We went in with the intention that we would all attend the program and in the end only one of us actually made it.
I kind of fell off the program wagon as soon as we entered the parking lot because I saw a sign hanging from one of the lampposts that said "Criminal Justice: Police and Corrections." This immediately caught my eye because while I had seen criminal justice as a program/major before at other schools, I had never seen corrections explicitly advertised. I pointed it out to another person in my group and we both wanted to know more.
After walking around aimlessly for a time, we stumbled upon the student activities office. There were two girls who looked around our age (20-somethings) and so we decided to walk in an attempt to talk to them. When we asked more questions about the program, they sent us up to the Student Engagement office, saying that they would be able to tell us everything we wanted to know.
The Student Engagement office did not tell us everything we wanted to know and promptly sent us to admissions. The woman at admissions loaded us up with booklets, information sheets and pamphlets about the Criminal Justice program and told us where we could find the head of the department. After some quick questions, we learned that people in the criminal justice major tended to be more on the police track than corrections and then we were on our way to find the department. Eventually, we ended up at the door of a dark and empty room in the back wing of the college. While we may not have found the head of the department, we did find 3 bulletin boards related to the department and the Criminal Justice Club. They were organized as such:
1. For the Club
Had pictures of the officers – all girls
Other information about programs and when they meet etc.
Pamphlet about the club with information about their mission statement, past activities and contact information
2. For the Department
General information about the department
Business cards for head of the department
Pamphlet with info about the department with a “Professional Preparation Checklist” on the inside “Complete the following checklist over the course of your academic journey to ensure successful opportunities upon graduation:”
3. For Job Opportunities and Information
Pinned to the bottom of the board – job listings for nearby counties and towns
Other general information about joining police force, border patrol, etc.
I found the content of the bulletin boards to be very interesting because it showed the college's direct links to the prison in a very visible manner. They had pamphlets about the program and the club, one which detailed some of the activities that the club, including visits to the Auburn prison. I thought this was interesting because I did not understand, based on what we knew about the prison at that time, how they would be doing visits to the prison. After talking to some people, I think it may be possible to take tours of the prison so that may what they do on these visits. In addition to this, they had job postings for surrounding areas for police and correctional positions. These materials made a relationship visible to me that I did not think would initially exist between the two entities.
Another visible connection between the college and the prison, which was pointed out to us by the campus safety officer, are the distinguished alumni signs hanging around the school. These signs highlight alumni that has have gone on to do notable things either in the community or outside. One of the signs had a graduate of the criminal justice program who went on to be a sergeant at the Auburn prison. The officer told us that the man would come to campus frequently to recruit and talk to students about corrections. He said that he was sure that the sergeant would talk to us if we contacted him and said that the school had sent us to talk to him. This furthered my understanding that the community college had more than a surface level relationship with the prison, the two worked closely with one another with regards to the Criminal Justice program.
What I find interesting about these findings is how they show a snapshot of something we had seen happen again and again through our research. We would walk into places not knowing if they had a connection to the prison or if they would lead us anywhere helpful and then find a variation of relationships in our visit. I think that often times upper level education and incarceration are seen as opposing ideas, but as we see here, sometimes they support one another in various ways.
Opmerkingen