NYU Prison Education Program Celebrates Graduation of 18 Students

On November 6, the NYU Prison Education Program (NYU PEP) celebrated their 2024 graduates with a ceremony at Wallkill Correctional Facility. This year’s cohort of 18 students all obtained their Associate of Arts (AA) in Liberal Studies, taking courses in areas such as social work, history, songwriting, art, creative writing, and social and cultural analysis. 

Founded in 2015, NYU PEP is a multi-partner, cross-university program that offers free college courses to incarcerated and formerly incarcerated students. Students earn transferable college credits while working towards their degree from NYU. NYU PEP faculty travel weekly to Wallkill to teach in person. 

To date, 300 incarcerated people have earned transferable NYU credits through the program.

“At Wallkill, NYU PEP has its own educational wing that includes two large seminar rooms, a computer lab, and an NYU library with over 300+ books and research materials,” says Dylan Brown, associate director of NYU PEP. “The program runs year-round, and each semester we offer approximately five to seven accredited NYU AA-level courses. We try to build a curriculum that is responsive to the academic interests and needs of our students.”

Jack H. Knott, Gale and Ira Drukier Dean of NYU Steinhardt, attended the ceremony, as well as Antonio Merlo, Anne and Joel Ehrenkranz Dean of the Faculty of Arts & Science; Georgina Dopico, provost of NYU; and Linda G. Mills, president of NYU, alongside NYU PEP faculty, staff, and several other university administrators and members of NYU’s Senior Leadership Team. 

“NYU PEP is a thriving program that helps our students—as well as the larger public—constructively re-envision life during, after, and beyond incarceration,” says Dean Knott. “By drawing on Steinhardt’s wide range of academic expertise, we are able to impact students’ capacity to contribute and succeed.”

While the majority of this year’s NYU PEP graduates are still currently incarcerated, five have returned home. Currently, the largest-ever cohort of PEP Washington Square Fellows are enrolled and working toward degree completion across schools at NYU. 

“To date, we’ve had more than 25 NYU PEP students complete their undergraduate degrees at NYU, with many going on to receive full-tuition scholarships to pursue master’s degrees. In fact, we recently had an NYU PEP alum enter a doctoral program  at the University of Miami,” says Brown. 

“My NYU degree is a source of empowerment and an opportunity to make a difference—to be a role model for my family, friends, and loved ones,” says Chauncy Ramos, who recently obtained his AA through NYU PEP. Ramos was released from Wallkill earlier this year and is in his first semester at NYU Silver School of Social Work, where he is working towards his bachelor’s degree in social work.

Post-release support is tailored to each individual and can include academic advising and assistance with housing, employment, and other social services. Students at the Washington Square campus are also active in the PEP Research Lab, collaborating with faculty to study the costs of incarceration and generate grounded policy recommendations and advocacy initiatives around responsible decarceration in the city and state.

“NYU PEP students have ranged from their mid-20s to those well into their 70s and 80s,” says Shabnam Javdani, associate professor of applied psychology at NYU Steinhardt and NYU PEP’s faculty director. “That’s a real testament to our professors, who are meeting a lot of different needs. Many faculty want to participate in NYU PEP to expand their own teaching experiences, and they find themselves, their practice, and their ability to engage with their students at NYU transformed as a result.”

NYU PEP is intentional about not looking at convictions or charges during the application process. Instead, it pays more attention to gauging college readiness and interest in liberal studies work, involving an essay and interview with NYU PEP staff and/or faculty.