LAPP represents an extraordinary learning opportunity for UVM students and incarcerated citizens alike. UVM students will have opportunities to participate as classmates, mentors, tutors, and remedial educators. They will experience the criminal justice system from a unique vantage point, and will have first-hand interaction with incarcerated citizens. Not only will this add a unique and important element to their educational experience, it will also inform and influence their perspectives and decisions as future voters, hiring officials, and policy makers.

• For more information, contact Kathy Fox at Kathy.fox@uvm.edu.

The Liberal Arts in Prison Program in the College of Arts and Sciences at the University of Vermont was established on March 20, 2017, when the university joined the Consortium for the Liberal Arts in Prison at the invitation of the Bard Prison Initiative (BPI). To commemorate the event, Daniel Karpowitz, director of policy and academics at BPI, visited UVM and delivered a talk to more than 200 faculty, staff, students, and community members. Karpowitz told the story of how the Bard Prison Initiative grew from a small pilot project to a national network, and read from his book College in Prison: Reading in an Age of Mass Incarceration. LAPP is the result of the long-time efforts of UVM Professor Kathryn Fox and her subsequent collaboration with Assistant Provost Kerry Castano and Associate Dean Patty Corcoran. Fox, LAPP’s inaugural director, made the initial foray into prison education in Vermont in spring 2017 when she taught a course in a local correctional facility to a combined group of UVM undergraduates and incarcerated citizens.

The program paused during the height of the pandemic and began again in fall 2021 as LAPP 2.0. In the new iteration, UVM students join those in confinement at the correctional facility to engage in meaningful activities such as mural design, painting, dance, and yoga. These activities provide enrichment for both those incarcerated and the students, who also learn more about prisons while sharing time and space with a different, broader community than they normally have access to.

Interested faculty can present their ideas for enriching short courses (e.g., debate, book discussion groups, etc.) and students from across UVM are invited to enroll to experience this unique opportunity.