The first tertiary school behind bars inside the Davao City Jail will be launched on July 29 with classes to start August this year.
Designed after the curriculum of the University of Southeastern Philippines, “College Education behind Bars” was initiated by Dr. Aland Mizell, Social Entrepreneurship Institute president and lawyer Atty. Susan Cariaga.
“Students at the jail will enroll in USEP. Inmate students will read the same university-assigned textbooks. Once the inmates graduate, they will receive a diploma from USEP,” Grace Taculin, Davao City Jail Warden said during a press conference on Wednesday.
According to Taculin, the program will offer several components like basic education, vocational training, life skills development, and substance abuse intervention with weekly sessions of Celebrate Recovery steps.
“After a semester of ongoing evaluation, courses in entrepreneurship, languages, computer skills, health-care and agriculture, anger management General Education Equivalence Diploma (GED) will be added.”
Taculin also noted that the only difference in this school is that USEP teachers will travel to Ma-a jail to teach course there, instead of the inmates going to the campus.
The schedule of classes will be on a daily basis, morning schedule will be for the female inmates and the afternoon and evening sessions will be for males.
Taculin said that currently, they are doing profiling for the qualified inmates who could enroll in the program.
Earlier this year, a two-storey building was built inside Davao City jail, funded by SEI.
The memorandum of agreement for college behind bars was signed by Dr. Mizell, lawyer Cariaga, USEP President Dr. Lourdes Generalao, and the Chief of the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology Dir. Serafin Petronio Barretto Jr., CESO IV for a Program on Prison Rehabilitation and College Education behind Bars last September 28, 2016, at the House of Representatives.
