10 ms·

Inmates at California’s San Quentin prison learn to code

143 points by correctifier 12y ago

krishna_sh 12y ago
San Quentin prison seems to be doing a great job at engaging prisoners. The inmates write beautiful answers on Quora too.
- deleted 12y ago
  [deleted]
- slayed0 12y ago
  I thought they weren't allowed internet access? >Of course, as the class is taught inside a prison, it has an extra obstacle—inmates don't have access to the Internet at all, and their only time spent with a computer is inside the classroom.
  - shawndrost 12y ago
    They are given printed quora questions by Last Mile staff, then they write the answers longhand. It's old school.
    - krishna_sh 12y ago
      Thats right. The answers come with a standard footer as well saying that they do not have internet access and that the prison staff was proofread the answer before posting.
estsauver 12y ago
Does anyone here know the people who are working with code 7370? I'd love to help in some way. I don't know if they're looking for code reviews or tutoring, or what I could provide, but I'd love to be of help. It seems like providing the inmates access to something like http://kapeli.com/dash http://kapeli.com/dash or mdn locally would be a godsend.
- rndmize 12y ago
  I know some of the people that were working on the program. I think the easiest way to start helping out would be to attend one of the related meetups: http://www.meetup.com/hackreactorx/events/218681201/ http://www.meetup.com/hackreactorx/events/218681201/ (I believe there's a meetup like this once a month or so.)
  - rhc2104 12y ago
    It looks like they would like volunteers to help build the curriculum. Is this curriculum open source?
- stevenspasbo 12y ago
  Same here, I'm only about 30 minutes away from the prison, I wonder if they would be open to book donations? I'm sure some O'Reilly and CS fundamentals books would help them out when they are out of class and don't have access to a computer.
  - shawndrost 12y ago
    Book donations: yes please! We have a library but we are building a permanent program (not a one-time thing) so a bigger library is better.
- shawndrost 12y ago
  I'm a cofounder at Hack Reactor -- we build the cirriculum and are running the daily events. Please contact me (shawn@hackreactor.com) with your interest. We have local copies of MDN installed and are adding a dash equivalent over xmas. (Dash is osx only -- I forget the equivalent for linux, which is all the institution could afford.)
  - cgag 12y ago
    The free software version is Zeal (http://zealdocs.org/ http://zealdocs.org/).
300bps 12y ago
So now when I tell friends and relatives who can't get a job that pays more than $12 per hour that they should learn how to code in their spare time, I have more ammunition. My favorite story to relay is an Indian woman whose husband came to the U.S. on an H1B visa. She came here on an unskilled visa. In her spare time at home while she was working as a maid, she taught herself programming. A year later she was making $60,000 per year. A few years later, making $80,000 per year. Every time I relay a story like this - the person I'm trying to convince has an excuse as to why it won't work for them. "Oh, but that was a different time! There are no jobs today!" I can't wait to hear the excuse as to why they can't learn to code even though prison inmates are now doing it.
- sdrothrock 12y ago
  > My favorite story to relay is an Indian woman whose husband came to the U.S. on an H1B visa. She came here on an unskilled visa. In her spare time at home while she was working as a maid, she taught herself programming. A year later she was making $60,000 per year. A few years later, making $80,000 per year. As a counterpoint, have you thought that it might not be the "ability to code," but rather the "drive to learn" that causes these people to be successful? I think that even if everyone could code, they wouldn't necessarily be successful, whereas someone who had that drive to go out, learn, expose themselves to new ideas, etc. presumably also has the drive to sell themselves and keep pushing.
GuiA 12y ago
> While the goal of Code 7370 is laudable, faced with competition from younger programmers, many of whom have handled computers since they were toddlers, will it make any meaningful difference for inmates? For now, it's too soon to tell. Of course it will make a meaningful difference for inmates (if only because in terms of all things one could do in jail, this is probably in the top 1% in terms of intellectual stimulation), and of course they could become high quality professionals after this. Especially given the fact that the training seems more intense to me than any of the bootcamps from which a lot of today's web devs come from ("four-day-per-week, eight-hour-per-day, six-month course" - most bootcamps are a few weeks, or a few months at the maximum). This sort of line of thought is so harmful. There's nothing magical about programming that makes it different from any other industry. You don't need to have been immersed in it your whole life to be an outstanding professional. It's not the case for chemical engineering, it's not the case for mechanical engineering, it's not the case for electrical engineering, why would it be true for computer engineering? Especially given the fact that of all the subfields in computer engineering, there's nothing deeply complex about HTML/CSS/JS because it relies on so few prerequisites (if you're writing low level assembly, it requires a deep understanding of the machine's architecture; if you're writing graphics code, it requires a solid knowledge of linear algebra. But there are no such foundations for web development).
- CoreSet 12y ago
  I'd also like to add that even if you're not a professional webdev (which I'm not), coding can be an immensely rewarding hobby and recreational pursuit, in addition to providing you with greater general insight into how a lot of everyday technology works.
  - masklinn 12y ago
    And either way, a deeper understanding of computers and the ability to script your way out of problem is a useful tool no matter what job you end up doing.
- hardwaresofton 12y ago
  There are tons of college grads that either didn't study computer science at all, or studied computer science and didn't do very well (and don't like it enough to do it outside of school) that are getting high-paying jobs (relative to general populace) at lots of big tech companies. The tech industry fancies itself a meritocracy/progressive -- programs like this will show just how much of that perception is real.
numlocked 12y ago
This is offered through a great program at San Quentin called The Last Mile. I got to know one Chrisfino Kenyatta a bit (a founding member of the program while he was an inmate) when our company was at RocketSpace, where he works. One day shortly after he started at RocketSpace, he asked how I was doing and I said "eh, surviving". Not knowing his background, I was caught a bit off-guard when he told me he had recently got out of San Quentin after 19 years, and gently reminded me that I was doing a bit better than just surviving. He's a great, great guy. He did a Tedx talk about his experience that is well worth watching. http://www.tedxmarin.org/2014-speakers/chrisfino-kenyatta-leal/ http://www.tedxmarin.org/2014-speakers/chrisfino-kenyatta-le... Totally coincidentally (though thanks to Kenyatta for being such a great ambassador for the program) we are interviewing a Last Mile member for an operations position at our company, ePantry, later today.
- stickperson 12y ago
  I came here to talk about Kenyatta, too. For sure thought I'd see his name in the article.
daviskim 12y ago
Go Hack Reactor!!
nowarninglabel 12y ago
We were fortunate enough to get to partner with Last Mile https://zip.kiva.org/trustees/186 https://zip.kiva.org/trustees/186 to fund Tulio: https://thelastmile.org/meet-the-people/alumni/tulio-k-cardozo/ https://thelastmile.org/meet-the-people/alumni/tulio-k-cardo... He's now Lead Developer at Launch Podium: https://launchpodium.com/company/ https://launchpodium.com/company/ And his side project is looking pretty good now compared to the last time I looked at it: http://collaborativebenefit.org/about-us/from-our-founder/ http://collaborativebenefit.org/about-us/from-our-founder/
morbius 12y ago
There are many prisons where inmates are encouraged to study business. This is a good, positive thing and if anything, it reflects the permeation of computer science down to even the most fundamental infrastructures of society. We still have a lot of work to do, but this is a very, very good sign.
lordnacho 12y ago
Perhaps they should be allowed to work remotely after graduating? You would think having a 60-100k job in sight would reduce recidivism. No idea what the stats are though. Society gets to continue punishing them for whatever they did, and the inmates gets something meaningful and productive to do.
Zelphyr 12y ago
I have an uncle that spent the better part of a decade in prison because of our idiotic drug laws. While he was in he learned coding (DBase if I recall--it was still popular at the time). He never used it after he got out. Why not? He has a marketable skill now, right? Sure. But nobody wants to hire an ex-con regardless of their skill. I think projects like this are great but we also need to address the problem of being able to find a job for these guys after they get out. Or, you know; get rid of the drug laws that put him there in the first place.
- Nicholas_C 12y ago
  >I think projects like this are great but we also need to address the problem of being able to find a job for these guys after they get out. Amen. This is a huge problem and probably a huge part of why recidivism rates are so high. If you can't get a job out of prison and you're low on money it's really easy to get your old drug/weed guy to front goods for you to sell. Instant cash, work on your own time, no background checks, work that is probably more exciting and interesting. Huge sentencing reform is needed and I encourage everyone to get active or at least put your ear to the ground about it. A great source of info is the Sentencing Project[0]. They send out e-mails regarding the status of reform in different states and other general current events and information. [0] http://www.sentencingproject.org/template/index.cfm http://www.sentencingproject.org/template/index.cfm
  - mschuster91 12y ago
    You'd not even need a sentencing reform to improve the chances of getting a job. Cash incentives (e.g. state pays 50% of the income of the employee for a year or two) for employers can be a much better starting point. Or educating prisoners e.g. to become licensed electricians, plumbers, ... like in Germany and then helping them to start their own business when out of jail. But the US system seems like focused 100% on punishment and generating revenue for private prisons, so I highly doubt this will ever be introduced - there's simply too much money at stake when former inmates actually rehabilitate.
    - 12y ago
shawndrost 12y ago
Hey yall -- I'm a cofounder at Hack Reactor, which wrote the curriculum and is running the program from an instruction and student success standpoint. This is my baby and it's exciting to see it getting some attention this week -- I think that prisons should be schools by default and I hope that public perception changes. AMA if you're curious.
- unclebucknasty 12y ago
  >I think that prisons should be schools by default Indeed. Good work you're doing there. Now, if we can make schools schools by default, then maybe we can skip the prison step altogether.
  - cognivore 12y ago
    "Now, if we can make schools schools by default, then maybe we can skip the prison step altogether." That's the best quote on HN I've read in a year.
- drjesusphd 12y ago
  I think this is a wonderful idea. Is there a place one can go to see volunteer opportunities?
  - shawndrost 12y ago
    email me -- shawn@hackreactor.com
- DonGateley 12y ago
  Please try to get this program into the federal prison system. I've got a friend there at Lompoc who would jump all over this. I'd be interested in assisting with that and as a retired computer professional I have the time. People noting the difficulty of finding employment having a prison/felony record should consider that there is an ever growing body of computer freelance work that only looks at bids and results. That domain is absolutely ideal for those with records for all kinds of reasons.
andyana 12y ago
Hans Reiser is at San Quentin.
- t0asterb0t 12y ago
  He appears to be at Pleasant Valley now: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Reiser https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Reiser
JSPy 12y ago
don't they know that the inmates will be able to launch missiles by whistling into the phone now?
tete 12y ago
This is a really great project! I think caring about people in prisons is one of the best ways to show the strength of a society. I know, the US/Californian prison system has many things to criticize and rant about (and people should!), but here is a great project to face some of those problems. It's really great, but I hope people keep pushing such projects. Prisons will probably never be empty, but setting that goal is always better than surrendering, cause huge costs, both financial and social ones. I hope such projects set an example for other states and countries.
taksintik 12y ago
It's criminal that bad guys get the luxury of learning while innocent children around a majority of school districts don't. We also spend 5-6X more annually housing inmates. Really strange decisions.

143 points by correctifier 12y ago

San Quentin prison seems to be doing a great job at engaging prisoners. The inmates write beautiful answers on Quora too.

deleted 12y ago
[deleted]
slayed0 12y ago
I thought they weren't allowed internet access? >Of course, as the class is taught inside a prison, it has an extra obstacle—inmates don't have access to the Internet at all, and their only time spent with a computer is inside the classroom.
- shawndrost 12y ago
  They are given printed quora questions by Last Mile staff, then they write the answers longhand. It's old school.
  - krishna_sh 12y ago
    Thats right. The answers come with a standard footer as well saying that they do not have internet access and that the prison staff was proofread the answer before posting.

estsauver 12y ago

Does anyone here know the people who are working with code 7370? I'd love to help in some way. I don't know if they're looking for code reviews or tutoring, or what I could provide, but I'd love to be of help. It seems like providing the inmates access to something like http://kapeli.com/dash http://kapeli.com/dash or mdn locally would be a godsend.

rndmize 12y ago
I know some of the people that were working on the program. I think the easiest way to start helping out would be to attend one of the related meetups: http://www.meetup.com/hackreactorx/events/218681201/ http://www.meetup.com/hackreactorx/events/218681201/ (I believe there's a meetup like this once a month or so.)
- rhc2104 12y ago
  It looks like they would like volunteers to help build the curriculum. Is this curriculum open source?
stevenspasbo 12y ago
Same here, I'm only about 30 minutes away from the prison, I wonder if they would be open to book donations? I'm sure some O'Reilly and CS fundamentals books would help them out when they are out of class and don't have access to a computer.
- shawndrost 12y ago
  Book donations: yes please! We have a library but we are building a permanent program (not a one-time thing) so a bigger library is better.
shawndrost 12y ago
I'm a cofounder at Hack Reactor -- we build the cirriculum and are running the daily events. Please contact me (shawn@hackreactor.com) with your interest. We have local copies of MDN installed and are adding a dash equivalent over xmas. (Dash is osx only -- I forget the equivalent for linux, which is all the institution could afford.)
- cgag 12y ago
  The free software version is Zeal (http://zealdocs.org/ http://zealdocs.org/).

300bps 12y ago

So now when I tell friends and relatives who can't get a job that pays more than $12 per hour that they should learn how to code in their spare time, I have more ammunition. My favorite story to relay is an Indian woman whose husband came to the U.S. on an H1B visa. She came here on an unskilled visa. In her spare time at home while she was working as a maid, she taught herself programming. A year later she was making $60,000 per year. A few years later, making $80,000 per year. Every time I relay a story like this - the person I'm trying to convince has an excuse as to why it won't work for them. "Oh, but that was a different time! There are no jobs today!" I can't wait to hear the excuse as to why they can't learn to code even though prison inmates are now doing it.

sdrothrock 12y ago
> My favorite story to relay is an Indian woman whose husband came to the U.S. on an H1B visa. She came here on an unskilled visa. In her spare time at home while she was working as a maid, she taught herself programming. A year later she was making $60,000 per year. A few years later, making $80,000 per year. As a counterpoint, have you thought that it might not be the "ability to code," but rather the "drive to learn" that causes these people to be successful? I think that even if everyone could code, they wouldn't necessarily be successful, whereas someone who had that drive to go out, learn, expose themselves to new ideas, etc. presumably also has the drive to sell themselves and keep pushing.

GuiA 12y ago

> While the goal of Code 7370 is laudable, faced with competition from younger programmers, many of whom have handled computers since they were toddlers, will it make any meaningful difference for inmates? For now, it's too soon to tell. Of course it will make a meaningful difference for inmates (if only because in terms of all things one could do in jail, this is probably in the top 1% in terms of intellectual stimulation), and of course they could become high quality professionals after this. Especially given the fact that the training seems more intense to me than any of the bootcamps from which a lot of today's web devs come from ("four-day-per-week, eight-hour-per-day, six-month course" - most bootcamps are a few weeks, or a few months at the maximum). This sort of line of thought is so harmful. There's nothing magical about programming that makes it different from any other industry. You don't need to have been immersed in it your whole life to be an outstanding professional. It's not the case for chemical engineering, it's not the case for mechanical engineering, it's not the case for electrical engineering, why would it be true for computer engineering? Especially given the fact that of all the subfields in computer engineering, there's nothing deeply complex about HTML/CSS/JS because it relies on so few prerequisites (if you're writing low level assembly, it requires a deep understanding of the machine's architecture; if you're writing graphics code, it requires a solid knowledge of linear algebra. But there are no such foundations for web development).

CoreSet 12y ago
I'd also like to add that even if you're not a professional webdev (which I'm not), coding can be an immensely rewarding hobby and recreational pursuit, in addition to providing you with greater general insight into how a lot of everyday technology works.
- masklinn 12y ago
  And either way, a deeper understanding of computers and the ability to script your way out of problem is a useful tool no matter what job you end up doing.
hardwaresofton 12y ago
There are tons of college grads that either didn't study computer science at all, or studied computer science and didn't do very well (and don't like it enough to do it outside of school) that are getting high-paying jobs (relative to general populace) at lots of big tech companies. The tech industry fancies itself a meritocracy/progressive -- programs like this will show just how much of that perception is real.

numlocked 12y ago

This is offered through a great program at San Quentin called The Last Mile. I got to know one Chrisfino Kenyatta a bit (a founding member of the program while he was an inmate) when our company was at RocketSpace, where he works. One day shortly after he started at RocketSpace, he asked how I was doing and I said "eh, surviving". Not knowing his background, I was caught a bit off-guard when he told me he had recently got out of San Quentin after 19 years, and gently reminded me that I was doing a bit better than just surviving. He's a great, great guy. He did a Tedx talk about his experience that is well worth watching. http://www.tedxmarin.org/2014-speakers/chrisfino-kenyatta-leal/ http://www.tedxmarin.org/2014-speakers/chrisfino-kenyatta-le... Totally coincidentally (though thanks to Kenyatta for being such a great ambassador for the program) we are interviewing a Last Mile member for an operations position at our company, ePantry, later today.

stickperson 12y ago
I came here to talk about Kenyatta, too. For sure thought I'd see his name in the article.

daviskim 12y ago

Go Hack Reactor!!

nowarninglabel 12y ago

We were fortunate enough to get to partner with Last Mile https://zip.kiva.org/trustees/186 https://zip.kiva.org/trustees/186 to fund Tulio: https://thelastmile.org/meet-the-people/alumni/tulio-k-cardozo/ https://thelastmile.org/meet-the-people/alumni/tulio-k-cardo... He's now Lead Developer at Launch Podium: https://launchpodium.com/company/ https://launchpodium.com/company/ And his side project is looking pretty good now compared to the last time I looked at it: http://collaborativebenefit.org/about-us/from-our-founder/ http://collaborativebenefit.org/about-us/from-our-founder/

morbius 12y ago

There are many prisons where inmates are encouraged to study business. This is a good, positive thing and if anything, it reflects the permeation of computer science down to even the most fundamental infrastructures of society. We still have a lot of work to do, but this is a very, very good sign.

lordnacho 12y ago

Perhaps they should be allowed to work remotely after graduating? You would think having a 60-100k job in sight would reduce recidivism. No idea what the stats are though. Society gets to continue punishing them for whatever they did, and the inmates gets something meaningful and productive to do.

Zelphyr 12y ago

I have an uncle that spent the better part of a decade in prison because of our idiotic drug laws. While he was in he learned coding (DBase if I recall--it was still popular at the time). He never used it after he got out. Why not? He has a marketable skill now, right? Sure. But nobody wants to hire an ex-con regardless of their skill. I think projects like this are great but we also need to address the problem of being able to find a job for these guys after they get out. Or, you know; get rid of the drug laws that put him there in the first place.

Nicholas_C 12y ago
>I think projects like this are great but we also need to address the problem of being able to find a job for these guys after they get out. Amen. This is a huge problem and probably a huge part of why recidivism rates are so high. If you can't get a job out of prison and you're low on money it's really easy to get your old drug/weed guy to front goods for you to sell. Instant cash, work on your own time, no background checks, work that is probably more exciting and interesting. Huge sentencing reform is needed and I encourage everyone to get active or at least put your ear to the ground about it. A great source of info is the Sentencing Project[0]. They send out e-mails regarding the status of reform in different states and other general current events and information. [0] http://www.sentencingproject.org/template/index.cfm http://www.sentencingproject.org/template/index.cfm
- mschuster91 12y ago
  You'd not even need a sentencing reform to improve the chances of getting a job. Cash incentives (e.g. state pays 50% of the income of the employee for a year or two) for employers can be a much better starting point. Or educating prisoners e.g. to become licensed electricians, plumbers, ... like in Germany and then helping them to start their own business when out of jail. But the US system seems like focused 100% on punishment and generating revenue for private prisons, so I highly doubt this will ever be introduced - there's simply too much money at stake when former inmates actually rehabilitate.
  - 12y ago

shawndrost 12y ago

Hey yall -- I'm a cofounder at Hack Reactor, which wrote the curriculum and is running the program from an instruction and student success standpoint. This is my baby and it's exciting to see it getting some attention this week -- I think that prisons should be schools by default and I hope that public perception changes. AMA if you're curious.

unclebucknasty 12y ago
>I think that prisons should be schools by default Indeed. Good work you're doing there. Now, if we can make schools schools by default, then maybe we can skip the prison step altogether.
- cognivore 12y ago
  "Now, if we can make schools schools by default, then maybe we can skip the prison step altogether." That's the best quote on HN I've read in a year.
drjesusphd 12y ago
I think this is a wonderful idea. Is there a place one can go to see volunteer opportunities?
- shawndrost 12y ago
  email me -- shawn@hackreactor.com
DonGateley 12y ago
Please try to get this program into the federal prison system. I've got a friend there at Lompoc who would jump all over this. I'd be interested in assisting with that and as a retired computer professional I have the time. People noting the difficulty of finding employment having a prison/felony record should consider that there is an ever growing body of computer freelance work that only looks at bids and results. That domain is absolutely ideal for those with records for all kinds of reasons.

andyana 12y ago

Hans Reiser is at San Quentin.

t0asterb0t 12y ago
He appears to be at Pleasant Valley now: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Reiser https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Reiser

JSPy 12y ago

don't they know that the inmates will be able to launch missiles by whistling into the phone now?

tete 12y ago

This is a really great project! I think caring about people in prisons is one of the best ways to show the strength of a society. I know, the US/Californian prison system has many things to criticize and rant about (and people should!), but here is a great project to face some of those problems. It's really great, but I hope people keep pushing such projects. Prisons will probably never be empty, but setting that goal is always better than surrendering, cause huge costs, both financial and social ones. I hope such projects set an example for other states and countries.

taksintik 12y ago

It's criminal that bad guys get the luxury of learning while innocent children around a majority of school districts don't. We also spend 5-6X more annually housing inmates. Really strange decisions.