Stealing from Public School to Feed the Prisoners Industrial Complex - Term Paper Example

Stealing From Public School to Feed the Prisoners Industrial Complex INTRODUCTION In the year 2001 USA PATRIOT Act, it has been observed that the United States has been increasingly monitored as a country that spends more on prisons industrial complex as compared to the educational institutions such as public schools (Project Censored, “Signs of an Emerging Police State”). “Think of American freedmen who, after centuries of being denied literacy in slavery, made schooling a centerpiece in the exercise of their hard-won freedom. As one former slave put it in the 1860s, “What would the best soil produce without cultivation? We want to get wisdom. That is all we need. Let us get that and we are made for time and eternity” (The President and Fellows of Harvard College, “The Capacity to Make History”). Despite an apparent drop in crime rates for the last decade in the US, there has been a steady escalation in the allocated budget for the prisoners. However, the education sector has been determined to be subjected to deprivation in terms of available financial resources to uphold the desired requirements. Thousands of school children on September, 2013 congregated to Cape Town’s City Hall demanding for libraries and schools which was definitely for “more knowledge and information.” Subsequently, it can be affirmed that the right to learn is surely the most fundamental right (The President and Fellows of Harvard College, “The Capacity to Make History”). The objective of the study is to define the scenario relating to the decision made by the States across the US where the government is cutting down its allocation of funds related to education and has been spending its budget more on prison instead of education. The study looks behind the picture where the government has given more priority to the prison as compared to the educational institution. Some might think that the government intends to save money in public school systems but the reason behind this is that there are people who earn huge profits in privatized prison. Correspondingly, the notion that education in comparison with prison should be the priority of the government in order to ascertain future sustainability will be substantiated. DISCUSSION 1) How the government spending more money on prisons than education negatively affects the students of public schools in the USA? The government has been observed to be spending more money on prisoners than students. According to Adwoa Masozi’s report, “On top of cutting 4 billion US dollars from their budget, Texas has also eliminated state funding for pre-K programs that serve around 100,000 mostly at-risk children” (Masozi, “Stealing From The Mouth Of Public Education To Feed The Prison Industrial Complex”). Furthermore, half a billion of funds has been cut in North Carolina’s school program which considers the requirement of lesser guidance counselors and social workers. Thus, loss of these kinds of school programs marks a dropout rate of about 27% in the country. Correspondingly, it can be substantiated that public education is definitely a necessary aspect in people education on knowledge development. “Public education is something more than a right, a liberty, or a privilege” according to Masozi (Masozi, “Stealing from the Mouth of Public Education to Feed the Prison Industrial Complex”). It has been considered as a need. Charter schools have been playing a part for providing a creative solution to various ways of education. It has also been recognized that education is backed by companies namely, Wal-Mart, JP Morgan, Wells Fargo and Bank of America that act as a major investment prospect for people in educational reformation and private prisons. The major reason behind the system not supporting students and not providing them a proper tool and guidance for learning is the increasing population of the prisoners. Besides, most of the people who are prisoners do not have a high educational qualification and school diploma and who lack the skills to be competitive in the current job market, as even low-level jobs has the requirement of high standard. It also seems impossible to push forward in education as only a selected few will survive (Masozi, “Stealing from the Mouth of Public Education to Feed the Prison Industrial Complex”). With reference to the NAAL standards belonging to the National Center for Education Statistics, there are 68 million individuals who are reading underneath basic levels. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities found that “nearly all states are spending less money (on education) than they spent in 2008 (after inflation), even though the cost of providing services will be higher” (Masozi, “Stealing From The Mouth of Public Education to Feed the Prison Industrial Complex”).Also, in the state of California there has been a rage of closing down of public schools, and a production of a best practice guide regarding how to close these public schools and make them fit perfectly until an expected change has even been observed. Instead, there should be a practice guide for keeping the schools going on. Lack of education reduces the employment opportunities and quality of people, besides there is an increasing likelihood of negative impact of health aspects, judicial system and criminal encounters. 2) Why don’t the media expose this to society? There is no exposure of these situations to the public as the media is manipulated, which is quite familiar. The actual situation does not have much reporting in the mainstream media, and the system rarely emerges in the media as they are controlled by authorities that supervise the news and make it very manipulative. The supervisors of the correspondents also act very unsupportive. There are many journalists who are not allowed to access the information of the system in the prison due to the restrictions implied on them. "Then, when you have your visit, its in a room with guards watching and people all around. Its not conducive to people being particularly forthcoming" (Vosters, “Media Lockout: Prisons and Journalists”). There are certain officials who are completely against the media coverage, as it might expose their involvement in the fraudulent system. In addition, there is no publication in news and broadcasting in media regarding a defunded system of public school that leaves behind the children, promotes more poverty, misery, lack of vocational opportunities and meaningful profession due to which there is a rise in criminal activities. "Thats a pretty major roadblock to doing journalism about prison conditions" says Thompson (Vosters, “Media Lockout: Prisons and Journalists”). Conversely, the prison will be filled with drugs, desperation and despair that get transformed into privatized profit institution which helps investors get more opportunities to increase their returns through US public underserved people, that never makes the pages of the US newspaper and broadcasting of the US corporate news outlets (Huff, 2012). United States is in administration of government and a kind of policy that leads to extinction of public education for all, and the transformation of brown, black and poor Latinos in prison has been in continuation. "Destruction of Public Education Feed the Prison Industrial Complex" is a call to reflection of Adwoa Masozi (Carmona, “Destroying Public Education Benefits the Prison-Complex Industrial”). 3) How the American system prison works against education? In contrast to the above mentioned situation, there are certain facts that work against the education system which include aspects such as California in 2006 spending 8,000 US Dollars on a student and 216,000 US Dollars on a juvenile prisoner. Moreover, from the last 20 years, the sum of money used up on prison has increased by 570% whereas the sum of money used up on educational purpose has augmented by 33%. Furthermore, 75% of prisoners are illiterate and at a reading level of 12th grade with which there are only 20% of prisoners who have their qualification in high school. From the last 30 years, California has been using up its huge portion of budget on prisons and a very small share of its budget on educational systems. The districts that used a small portion of its budget on classrooms were Oakland Unified that used 54% and San Francisco that used 47% of its budget. The country has made deep cuts in funding of educational purpose in its recent years. The country’s spending on educational purpose rose at 7.4 billion US Dollars in the year 2007, and has been declining ever since then (Gollan, and Lupkin, “Education vs. Prisons: Shifting Priorities”). According to Gollan and Lupkin, "California is clearly the worst in the U.S. for what we get and what we spend. California has the largest prison system in the U.S., it is the most expensive per capita rate in the U.S. and the state has some of the highest recidivism rates of any state in the nation" (Gollan, and Lupkin, “Education vs. Prisons: Shifting Priorities”). According to the California Prison Focus, “the private contracting of prisoners for work fosters incentives to lock people up. Prisons depend on this income. Corporate stockholders who make money off prisoners’ work lobby for longer sentences, in order to expand their workforce. The system feeds itself” says a study by the Progressive Labor Party (Hodges, “The Prison Industrial Complex”). It accuses the prison industry of being “an imitation of Nazi Germany with respect to forced slave labor and concentration camps” (Hodges, “The Prison Industrial Complex”). In accordance with the Left Business Observer, “the highly privatized federal prison industry produces 100% of all military helmets, ammunition belts, bullet-proof vests, ID tags, shirts, pants, tents, bags, and canteens” (Hodges, “The Prison Industrial Complex”). “You shouldn’t be arrested for stealing a free education. It’s just wrong” Darnell Crosland, McDowell’s attorney said (AlterNet, “Stealing" Free Education? Homeless Mother Gets Jail”). CONCLUSION According to the above observation, there has been a huge sum of money being spent on prisons instead of educational institutions, by the US government. This particular aspect might turn out be a risk factor for the growing children as there is insufficient allocation of funds in educational institutions. Besides, it has been determined that there is a kind of racial trend being followed by the US officials where the black, brown and Latinos are sent to prison and subjected to transformation. Moreover, it has been viewed that there are certain relevant statistics which support the fact that the country has been making deep cuts in its funding of educational institutions in its recent years that has been declining every year. There are even various districts in the US that use their huge portion of funds on prison and comparably a very small portion of their funds on educational institutions. Works Cited “Stealing" Free Education? Homeless Mother Gets Jail Time For Sending Her Son to a Better School District.” AlterNet. 2012. Web. 19 Jan. 2014. Carmona, Ernesto. Destroying Public Education Benefits The Prison-Complex Industrial. 2012. Web. 19 Jan. 2014. Gollan, Jennifer and Lupkin, Sydney. Education vs. Prisons: Shifting Priorities. 2011. Web. 19 Jan. 2014. Hodges, Dave. The Prison Industrial Complex. 2013. Web. 19 Jan. 2014. Huff, Mickey. Censored 2013: The Top Censored Stories and Media Analysis of 2011-2012. New York: Seven Stories Press, 2012. Print. Masozi, Adwoa. Stealing From the Mouth of Public Education to Feed the Prison Industrial Complex. 2012. Web. 19 Jan. 2014. “Signs of an Emerging Police State.” Project Censored. 2003. Web. 19 Jan. 2014. “The Capacity to Make History.” The President and Fellows of Harvard College. 2013. Web. 19 Jan. 2014. Vosters, Helene. Media Lockout: Prisons and Journalists. n.d. Web. 19 Jan. 2014. Read More