For BPI, every month is a month to study and celebrate Black History. As Bard College students, BPI students become scholars in their own right, not just absorbing course material but producing vital contributions to the literature. This February we asked BPI alumni what… Read More
BPI Blog
Tag: Education
International Congress on Higher Education in Prisons in Argentina, April 2023
BPI is pleased to announce that through support from the Open Society University Network (OSUN) and in partnership with Incarceration Nations Network (INN), we have funded an International Congress on Higher Education in Prisons that will take place in Buenos Aires, Argentina this spring.… Read More
Looking Back: JSTOR’s origins in prison
Recently ITHAKA S+R has made a major push to expand access to JSTOR inside prisons not just for incarcerated college students but to increase access to academic journals for all incarcerated people. This development comes more than a decade after BPI pioneered the idea… Read More
Community Voices: Dean Ansell’s remarks at Emerson Prison Initiative’s First Commencement
On September 27th the Emerson Prison Initiative held a historic celebration: the first Emerson College BA ceremony at MCI Concord and the first BA ceremony ever held at the facility. These amended remarks were given that day by Amy Ansell, Dean of the Marlboro… Read More
BPI Completes Fourth Annual Summer Residency
The BPI Summer Residency is a professional development opportunity that provides hands-on, experiential training in the hows, whys, and whats of BPI’s approach to college-in-prison. This July, emerging college-in-prison educators and practitioners from California, Oregon, Virginia, Massachusetts, Connecticut, Missouri, New York, and Hawai’i as well… Read More
Introducing the BPI Global Initiatives Virtual Lecture Series
The Bard Prison Initiative, in partnership with the Open Society University Network and Incarceration Nations Network, is pleased to invite you to the BPI Global Initiatives Virtual Lecture Series. This lecture series is designed for a global community of practitioners in different higher education contexts… Read More
BPI Adds a New Location at Albion Correctional Facility: Hiring New Faculty!
BPI’s newest campus at Albion Correctional Facility, a medium-security women's prison, is now open! This spring, BPI extended a warm welcome to the inaugural cohort, who began their Bardian careers this spring, immersing themselves in the traditional Language and Thinking workshop and utilizing the… Read More
Augustana College joins the Consortium for the Liberal Arts in Prison
Earlier this year, BPI proudly announced its newest member of the Consortium for the Liberal Arts in Prison: the Augustana Prison Education Program (APEP). BPI launched the Consortium in 2009 to facilitate the further establishment of college-in-prison nationwide. The Consortium currently represents fourteen colleges… Read More
Alumni Opinion: The Importance of TAP Restoration
The restoration of access to New York’s need-based Tuition Assistance Program (TAP) for college-in-prison is monumental. Receiving an education behind bars permanently changed my life in many ways. A year into receiving my associate degree through the Bard Prison Initiative, there was no doubt… Read More
TAP is Back
Dear Friends, Today, after 26 years – at last – New York State has repealed its ban on incarcerated people receiving TAP grants. In our field – since the evisceration of education in prison in the mid-1990s – the fundamental goal has been the restoration… Read More