Do Something New, Try Something New, Make a Positive Change in the World
CMU Prison Education Project
Carnegie Mellon University's Prison Education Project (CMU PEP) is committed to bringing education into prison, offering new opportunities to inmates and CMU students, and building dialogue across class, racial and social lines.
Prisons play a key role in the U.S. economy and incarceration rates in the U.S. surpass those of any country in the world. We need to learn more about our prison system: what its origins are, whose interests it serves, and how it compares with systems of incarceration in other countries.
Based on the philosophy of Inside-Out, a nationwide prison education program, CMU PEP offers several courses each academic year within nearby prisons. Faculty and CMU students travel together by bus to and from the prison once a week. Each course, which combines CMU students and inmates, provides full credit to CMU and incarcerated students and follows a regular CMU curriculum. CMU students should register for PEP courses through normal channels and will be asked to fill out a short questionnaire, which professors will review to determine eligibility.
Fall 2024 Course Offerings
CMU PEP courses are taught on Friday afternoons at Somerset State Correctional Institution. CMU and incarcerated students will take the course together. CMU students and instructors will travel and return by chatered bus. The bus leaves at 12:30 p.m. returns around 7 p.m.
Registration opens Monday, April 15.
85-201: Psychology and Society
Instructor: Kody Make-Miller
Psychology and Society focuses on how knowledge of psychology can improve our lives and society, in domains from health to relationships to education to intergroup interactions and more. The course will be largely discussion based, with readings, reading quizzes, and brief written reflections. Students will use the things they learn about psychology to suggest ways to improve problems that they care about.
English 76-245 "Shakespeare: Tragedies and Histories"
Instructor: Stephen Wittek
In the closing decades of the sixteenth century, cultural producers in early modern London began to develop a new commercial venture called ‘playing’: a business that offered ordinary people a few hours of dramatic entertainment for the price of one penny. More than four hundred years later, the drama of that period now ranks among the most esteemed texts in all English literature, and the name ‘Shakespeare’ has become a byword for literary genius. This course will offer an overview of Shakespeare’s tragedies and histories, what they meant to audiences then, and how they influence us today.
Student Experiences
"Being a part of [this] course [...] was one of the most unique and rewarding experiences I’ve had at CMU, as I was able to engage in profound discussions with people I do not normally interact with on a daily basis — students who were ostensibly so different from myself but filled with compassion and expressed just as much enthusiasm, if not more, for psychology as I did. I found this course to be irreplaceable by any other traditional college class, providing a distraction-free learning experience where we could all come together and dive deep into the material [and] openly share our thoughts with one another [...] In short, this experience both challenged my naive assumptions surrounding people who are incarcerated and also helped shape how I think about psychology and education in general."
— Amor, Junior, Triple Major in Statistics, Psychology and Decision Science
"I cannot begin to express how much [this course] was appreciated. I always looked forward to Fridays, not only because I was getting off the housing unit and going to school, but mainly because the professor and the CMU students treated me and the other inmates like real people."
— Brandon, SCI Somerset
"This program gave me an amazing opportunity to expose myself to people with different life experiences than mine. It's not every day you get the chance to communicate across difference in this way, especially in a setting where the goal is to learn with each other. It's been an inclusive and inspiring learning experience that I'm grateful was a part of my time here."
— Camille, Junior, Double Major, Psychology and Decision Science
"The CMU Prison Education Project was one of the most influential experiences I have ever had. I have never been in a class with more engaging, perceptive and dedicated students, and this program entirely changed my relationship with education and learning. The CMU Prison Education Project is truly a once in a lifetime opportunity and I could not recommend this course more."
— Rowan, Junior, School of Drama
"All in all, I have thoroughly enjoyed the entire experience of the program. It offered an enclave of humanity and higher education within an environment that is often bereft of both. I was challenged by new perspectives, gained useful knowledge of a fascinating topic and developed an interest in further learning. The concepts and ideas sparked by the lectures, readings, discussions and in-class interactions will continue to motivate me toward positive action and success."
— Jacob, SCI Somerset
"Through the CMU Prison Education Program, I have been able to explore different perspectives that I wouldn’t otherwise find on campus. I’ve really enjoyed being able to listen and have deep conversations with people whose life experiences are vastly different from mine."
— Jennifer, Senior, Major, Computer Science
"Being a part of the [CMU Prison Education Project] in my last semester of college is a memory that will stay with me for a very long time. It’s such a unique opportunity for college students, and it has heavily changed my perception on prisons and prison systems. The inside students I spent time with were some of the most passionate students I’ve ever met, and I loved that we could learn so much from each other just by being in each other’s presence."
— Catherine, Senior, Major, Design
"The experience of watching equal numbers of CMU and Somerset Prison students get certificates for completing courses taught this semester was deeply gratifying. Our students were transformed and said so. The prison students were profoundly grateful and said so. The professors were profoundly energized and said so. I've been in higher education for 35 years, and I've never seen anything like it."
— Richard Scheines, Bess Family Dean, Dietrich College of Humanities and Social Sciences
Thank You Cards
Art courtesy of SCI Somerset students
Spring 2023, "Russian History: Game of Thrones" with Prof. Wendy Goldman
Outside of card
Inside of card
Spring 2023, "Psychology, Society and the Human Brain" with Prof. Kody Manke-Miller
Fall 2023, "Major Fiction: Then and Now" with Prof. Jeffrey Williams
Illustration features clues about the novels' plots
The CMU Prison Education Project is funded through the generous support of the dean in Dietrich College, participating academic departments, and the educational labor of participating faculty.