Staffordshire University teaches degree course in prison

Dovegate prison in Staffordshire runs first workplace foundation degree in offender management

Lucy Tobin The Guardian, Tuesday 29 March 2011

In a lecture theatre in Staffordshire, 15 students are at an induction session for a new foundation degree. They talk about their upcoming modules, which include law, crime and criminal psychology, while nearby all the usual campus facilities – library, medical centre, gym, football pitches – are filled with people. But this is a far cry from the UK's other seats of higher education: the residents at this site include murderers, rapists and thieves. This is Dovegate prison in Staffordshire, and the undergraduates are prison officers embarking on Britain's first workplace foundation degree in offender management, run by Staffordshire University and Stafford College.

The group includes prison custody officers and an assistant director. Some are bosses, others junior members of staff, but all are having to switch from barking orders all day to listening to instructions in the classroom.

"It's going to be a bit of a challenge," admits Gillian Curtis, 29, a custodial officer at Dovegate. "Switching from organising prisoners, being in charge and running their lives, to going back to school will be difficult. I'm going to be the one who has to listen and produce the work demanded of me, plus ask for support and advice, rather than giving it out to prisoners all day, as I'm used to."

Yet Curtis is filled with excitement at the prospect of starting the degree. "I left school at 16 and worked as an administrator at a car finance firm, but always regretted missing out on university," she says. "I've done NVQs in custodial management while working at the prison, but it's something completely different to get a degree. I'm a bit scared but mostly can't wait to start studying."

To read full article, click here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/education/2011/mar/29/first-workplace-degree-dovegate-prison?CMP=twt_gu