College students, inmates and a nun: A unique book club meets at one of the nation’s largest jails
CHICAGO– For student Nana Ampofo, an unconventional book club in one of the country’s largest prisons has transformed her career aspirations.
Every week, the 22-year-old drives a van from her DePaul University colleagues to the Cook County Jail to discuss books with inmates and, most recently, noted activist Sister Helen Prejean. Ampofo offers thought-provoking questions to spark conversations in Chicago prison about the most recent books they read together.
One club rule is clear: Discussions about personal lives are encouraged, but no questions are allowed about why other members are in prison.
“That’s part of dehumanizing people. You want people to tell you their own story and have their own autonomy,” says Ampofo. “If you go in with an open mind, you will see how many people are like you.”
The student-led volunteer effort began years ago as an outgrowth of a DePaul program that offered college credit to students and inmates at the jail on the city’s southwest side. The book club, with a new cohort every academic quarter, tackles books that personally resonate with group members, almost all of whom are Black or Latino.
Associated Press journalists were allowed into the jail Monday to attend the current club’s final meeting to discuss Prejean’s book “Dead Man Walking,” where the anti-death penalty activist from Louisiana made a special appearance. The book, which was also adapted into a film, is about her experiences as a spiritual advisor to a few men on death row in the 1980s.
Ten inmates in brown prison uniforms sat in a circle in a window-filled prison chapel between four students and Prejean, who attends Catholic University in Chicago every year.
Ampofo, who advocated for Prejean’s visit, cried as she talked about how important the group members and their discussions are to her. Laughter erupted when Prejean told a vulgar joke about Bayou folk figures from Louisiana. And there was vigorous nodding when Steven Hayer, an inmate, discussed why many prisoners return to prison.
“Our society does not invest in solutions,” he said. “And when they get out, they will return to what they know.”
Book club members took the opportunity to ask Prejean questions, including the differences between the book and the movie and what it’s like to watch people die.
The 85-year-old nun was present at seven executions. Her archival papers are housed at DePaul, including script notes for the 1995 film starring Susan Sarandon.
After witnessing her first execution, Prejean said she wanted to throw up, but decided it was a privilege to be with people in their final moments.
“When you’ve witnessed something, it starts to burn a fire in your heart for justice, that we have to change this,” she said.
As a white woman who grew up in the South, Prejean said working in prison opened her eyes about racism.
Most of the book club’s inmate members are black, reflecting the demographics of the prison, which houses nearly 5,000 inmates. According to Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart, about 70% of inmates are involved in some form of educational programming such as book club.
But student participation sets the book club apart from other activities.
“If you suddenly have students from outside sitting next to you, you start to think about yourself differently,” says Dart. “It changes the mentality.”
Inmates are invited to participate based on their interests, he said. Their behavior on the inside determines their ability to participate, not what they serve time for, he added. Health problems are also taken into account.
The prison’s waiting list to access the club is a maximum of 40 people.
Jarvis Wright, who has been incarcerated in Cook County for two years, said he is a reader but had never been to a book club before. The 30-year-old reads in the evenings when it is quiet in prison. The other book club choices included “The Color of Law,” which delves into residential segregation.
“Even though we’re trapped here waiting for our cases to go to trial, this gives us something positive to look forward to,” Wright said. “We’re not just sitting here wasting time.”
DePaul has offered college classes since 2012 through a national program called the Inside-Out Prison Exchange. The classes are held at both the Cook County Jail and the Stateville Correctional Center, a maximum security men’s prison about 40 miles from Chicago.
There are guards present during the book club, but no one is chained.
Helen Damon-Moore, who oversees prison education programs at DePaul, says there has never been a safety problem.
“They’re all equal when they’re in,” Damon-Moore said.
Stanley Allen, a 36-year-old inmate, said he was attracted to the club because it was affiliated with a university. He hopes to take classes in the future. For him, the most surprising part of the club was meeting the students and Prejean.
“There are really good people there,” he said.
Other book club members say the experience has brought them closer together.
“I feel like I’m talking to a bunch of my brothers,” Seven Clark, a DePaul sophomore from Chicago, told the group. ‘The way you talk is so familiar. It feels like home.”
Ampofo will return to prison by the end of the week when a new club focusing on black women’s writing begins. It is a subject that appeals to her as the American-born daughter of a Ghanaian immigrant mother.
Ampofo is the first in her family to graduate from high school and plans to pursue further education to pursue museum studies. She dreams of improving access to museums for inmates and their families.
“I want to take care of people,” she said. “And I have found the people I want to take care of.”