Rutgers GSE Doctoral Students Co-Author Chapter in Palgrave Handbook on Carceral Education
Education in prison settings presents unique challenges, where traditional instructional approaches often fall short. In a chapter featured in the Palgrave Handbook on the Education of Children in Criminal Justice Settings, published this month, Rutgers Graduate School of Education doctoral students Max Jacobs, EdM. ‘16, and Ashley Lipscomb, alongside Distinguished Professor Dr. Benjamin Justice, share insights from a transformative professional development initiative conducted with the New Jersey Department of Corrections (NJDOC).
The chapter details a professional development project designed to help correctional educators create and implement trauma-informed teaching and learning practices. By combining action research methodology, trauma-informed pedagogy, and racial literacy, the project created a space for educators to analyze their working conditions and teaching methods.
For Lipscomb, a Ph.D. student, participating as a workshop facilitator aligned with her passion for liberatory educational practices. Drawing from her background, which includes studies at Harvard Divinity School and interning with a chaplain in an incarcerated setting, Lipscomb emphasizes why trauma-informed care is essential in these environments.
“Trauma-informed teaching in carceral education requires an understanding of structural and cultural aspects of racism, ways to address traumatic experiences, and an asset-based approach to teaching and learning,” she said. “Trauma-informed teaching is important in carceral settings because, as we state in the chapter, ‘prisons are monuments to trauma.’”
Educators used the tools developed through the professional development program to discuss and process workplace experiences following traumatic events.
“The moments that stood out to me the most were the ways some educators were willing and open to do the deep work of questioning and developing a critical analysis of their experiences,” Lipscomb said.
Jacobs, who served as lead author on the chapter, managed the logistics, led sessions, and coordinated efforts between the GSE and the NJDOC team. His interest in this research area comes from a desire to connect his background in education with his family’s experience working in the criminal justice system.
“I recognized this project connects my world with theirs, which has led me to think deeper and research more into the relationship between criminal justice and education,” he said.
Throughout the project, Jacobs observed the differences between teaching in traditional classrooms versus prison classrooms. The correctional educators communicated how meaningful it was to be treated as professionals, and the symposium showcased the engagement with academic research to better understand their working conditions, he said.
“Especially in the U.S. context, this project is extremely important,” Jacobs said. “This project offers a novel way to not only conduct professional development for correctional educators, but also offers another way higher education institutions can partner with correctional authorities to offer a more balanced, more responsive institutional collaboration.”
The project’s impact extends into both students’ ongoing academic work. Inspired by the project, Jacobs’ dissertation research explores records from the Philadelphia House of Refuge to examine how delinquents were educated. Lipscomb is writing her dissertation proposal in hopes that some of the Black 19th-century educational history she uncovers might contribute to the work that began in this project.
Through their co-authored chapter, Jacobs, Lipscomb, and Dr. Justice share how a trauma-informed approach “is an important tool to cultivate an educational practice that is rooted in human dignity, intellectual emancipation, and societal transformation,” Jacobs said.