Digital exclusion or learning exclusion? An ethnographic study of adult male distance learners in English prisons

Abstract

Previous research has highlighted the value of technology to enhance learning. However, digital inclusion research has argued that many issues such as skills, access, usability and choice impact on the effectiveness of technology to enhance learning. The findings in this paper add to the debate by highlighting the importance of value and context. In particular, the value that institutions and individuals place on the role of further and higher distance learning in a prison can affect technology-enhanced learning in that context. This research identified that despite good IT skills and improved technologies, prison learners’ access and use of technology is hampered by conflicting priorities amongst the multiple organisations controlling prisoner activities. This can lead to a prison in which menial work is valued far higher than learning. Technology-enhanced distance learning, perceived by many to be a lifeline in a desolate environment, is heavily restricted in such prisons. The situation is thought to be deteriorating as the number of organisations involved increases and the Government's plans for “working” prisons gather pace

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“…(incarcerated USQ TPP student, 2013) As higher education researchers (Watts, 2010;Pike & Adams, 2012;MacGuinness, 2000) in the UK have pointed out, education is often a 'lifeline' or survival strategy which enables student-inmates to cope with the 'pains,' or subjective experiences of imprisonment. In prison, education does much more than improve employability; it is a valuable tool to deal with time, isolation, psychological instability and the loss of personal autonomy (MacGuinness, 2000;Watts, 2010;Pike & Adams, 2012). In this study, USQ TPP incarcerated students frequently disclosed the emotional hurdles and experiences of depression, detachment, victimisation and apathy that had, at times, derailed their study schedules:…”

“…In the artificial, closed or 'total' institution of the prison, inmates lose the capacity to manage their own space and time subject to the institutional operational priorities of security, regulation and control through isolation (Goffman, 1990;Wilson & Reuss, 2000;Reuss, 2000;Watts, 2010;Pike & Adams, 2012). This dehumanising process is at odds both with education programs such as the TPP which aim to develop the student's autonomy, self-management and selfdetermination and with the modern correctional system's own aims of facilitating self-development and rehabilitation.…”

A race to the bottom – prison education and the English and Welsh policy context

“…These inflexibilities are well documented (Bracken 2011;Pike 2012;Rogers et al, 2014) and include, for example, the frequent transfer of prisoners between institutions; a narrow curriculum focussing on basic or 'employability' skills; limited or non-existent Internet access for many prisoners; chronic staff shortages; and an over emphasis on security and efficiency to the detriment of education and training (e.g. limiting what resources can be brought into prison learning environments).…”

“…Ministry of Justice figures reveal that the average cost of a prison place in England and Wales in 2012/13 was £36,808 (MoJ 2013b). Yet despite (or in spite of) this high expenditure, two thirds of released adult male prisoners in England are reconvicted within two years (Pike & Adams 2012), with the European Commission estimating the financial cost of recidivism in England and Wales at some 71 billion Euros (Hawley et al, 2013).…”

“…Higher Education (HE) courses do exist in English and Welsh prisons and are considered to be potentially transformative for prisoners (Duguid and Pawson 1998;Wilson and Reuss 2000;Pike and Adams 2012). However while access to these courses is more widely available and more easily embedded in high security prisons with long-term prison populations, those prisoners who are coming towards the end of their sentences (and therefore have been moved into lower level category prisons) will, in many cases, no longer have access to these longer (and more costly) educational courses.…”