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2024 Election Coverage

Inside Goucher College's prison education program

The Goucher Prison Education Partnership (GPEP), a division of Goucher College, provides men and women incarcerated in Maryland with the opportunity to pursue an college education. Credit: Goucher Prison Education Partnership
The Goucher Prison Education Partnership (GPEP), a division of Goucher College, provides men and women incarcerated in Maryland with the opportunity to pursue an college education. Credit: Goucher Prison Education Partnership

Since 2012, the Goucher Prison Education Partnership has offered college courses to men and women at two Maryland prisons. Executive Director Eliza Cornejo describes how Goucher stays in touch even after participants leave prison to help them continue their studies or find work.

And William Freeman, a graduate, now pursuing a Master’s degree from Johns Hopkins University, says signing up for GPEP was a no-brainer, "One, I had the time, and two, there were other individuals who were in close proximity to me that I could witness on any day studying in small groups. And I used to see the level of intent and purpose that they seemed to have with the material and with one another, and I wanted it."

Watch Freeman's 2020 Commencement speech here. Learn more about becoming a volunteer with GPEP.

This interview originally aired August 17, 2022.

Sheilah Kast is the host of On The Record, Monday-Friday, 9:30-10:00 am.
Maureen Harvie is Senior Supervising Producer for On the Record. She is a graduate of the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and joined WYPR in 2014 as an intern for the newsroom. Whether coordinating live election night coverage, capturing the sounds of a roller derby scrimmage, interviewing veterans, or booking local authors, she is always on the lookout for the next story.