Michael Anguille: Breaking Chains with Education
Ten years ago, I was incarcerated and seriously lacking direction. Oh, I was college educated, sure, and had plenty of work experience. But this only goes so far behind the walls. I was in full-on survival mode, my body in a perpetual state of fight-or-flight. I needed something to calm my mind, to quell the constant anxiety. I needed a breath of fresh air.
I took my first Exchange for Change class more as something to do than anything else. I’d just transferred to a prison that had “educational programs,” but was highly skeptical. Coming from a background where I was formally educated, I’d found the few “scholastic” opportunities I’d encountered behind bars severely lacking in form and function. I was pleasantly surprised, then, when I met my first E4C instructor. He handed me a syllabus, and spoke with the class without an urban bent. He was a college professor with a master’s degree. He had no war stories to tell, no redemption story common to the “classes” behind bars (many of which are taught by other incarcerated men and women, all of whom invariably have tales of their own to share). He had only knowledge to give. And compassion.
In that first class, we corresponded with students at the University of Miami. We were encouraged to share our stories, in writing, to dialogue back and forth about what it is to be incarcerated in America, but also to be separated from family and friends, to be excommunicated from our ambitions, our dreams for the future. My student writing partner told me I totally changed his perspective of what it is to be incarcerated in our country. In return, I gained an outlet of a type I didn’t have with family and friends, where personal connections sometimes complicate interactions. It was therapeutic. It was fulfilling.
It was everything I needed.
And so I signed up for more classes in future semesters. Fiction, non-fiction. In each course, I was encouraged to think critically, to be as candid as I wished to be without the fear of reprisal or judgment. I was challenged, and forced to separate myself from my surroundings intellectually. I made new friends with my incarcerated colleagues and had discussions about my “process;” I found new mentors in my E4C instructors. I was uplifted and newly motivated. In short, I found a sense of purpose in my incarceration that transcended writing, even.
It’s perhaps tired to say that education behind bars – quality education like that which E4C offers its students – is beneficial. But it is the undeniable truth. Statistics are clear that men and women who take educational programming while incarcerated are infinitely less likely to reoffend. I was so involved in my E4C courses that I didn’t have the time or the interest to partake in the abundance of destructive activities available behind bars. I just wanted to learn, to think critically, to be as analytical as I knew I could be – and to progress. I come from a background where education is prized, and so it’s true that a lot of these feelings weren’t new to me so much as latent. I’d put them on the backburner so I could fight to survive. Yet, these feelings are new for so many who take E4C classes, and may not have been fortunate enough
to have the educational opportunities I did in my relatively privileged youth. Imagine how E4C changes them.
And this says nothing of the deeper emotional benefits of being involved in programs like E4C. My classes created an outlet for me to tell my story, or perhaps to create stories outside of myself. But always, they were a respite from the constant fear and anxiety that drives every incarcerated man and woman. They were an escape, but one that was enriching rather than intoxicating (a state many incarcerated people, including myself, know all too well). I felt good about myself again, better able to cope with my surroundings because I was suddenly working towards something. I had stories to tell, incarcerated colleagues to discuss these stories with, instructors who actually cared what I had to say – and who were vested in helping me grow. I felt human again.
Towards the end of my bid, I’d run out of E4C classes to take. But the work ethic instilled in me never wavered, the motivation to continue making progress. The effort and constancy I’d put into my studies with E4C carried over to new projects outside the classroom. I spent hours every day writing and polishing short stories of my own. I read more and more, and started studying for what I decided would be my next professional endeavour outside the walls: a legal education.
Today, I am proud to say I am the statistic – in a good way. Since my release from incarceration two years ago, I have written numerous short stories, two screenplays, and been widely published as a journalist focused on all things pertaining to incarceration. I sit on two non-profit boards, and am the co-founder and executive director of the nation’s only award program which recognizes excellence in journalism among incarcerated people, the Stillwater Awards. I hold a highly respectable job in corporate America, have a 401k, money in the bank, and a thriving personal life where love and support abound. And as for law school… I took my LSAT the year following my release from prison. Just last month, I was offered a significant scholarship to a top 100 law school. I start this fall.
Did E4C create these opportunities for me? Not directly. But the work ethic E4C classes instilled in me, the ability to think critically, to analyze my work, and that of others, the desire to work hard on any project placed in front of me written or otherwise…there was no better occupational rehabilitation than this. Indeed, E4C was everything I had no idea I needed. It was a beacon of light in an otherwise dark, dark place. And it’s helped me become the man I am today.
I don’t recommend prison to anyone, but if it is inescapable, E4C is the path to a brighter existence behind the walls, and then to success in the free world.
– Michael Anguille
