Hiring Practices in Prison Education:Part One, Protect Ya Neck​Respectfully, Jose Pineda

I often hear people say: “The people who are closest to the problem are also closest to the solutions.” People with decision-making titles are often eager to amplify the embodied wisdom of survivors; yet, those leadership positions remain occupied by allies in the fight for social justice rather than the directly-impacted veterans beside them. The gap between rhetoric and reality is reinforced everyday in the nonprofit-industrial-complex. When it comes to college programs in New York prisons, the chasm is quietly turning into an echo chamber. This text is food for thought.

New York passed Proposition 1 on November 2, 2024. This amendment to the State Constitution, effectively expands constitutional protections against discrimination. While anti-discrimination protections already existed in various federal, state and local laws, this amendment lowers barriers and raises stakes. Experts say new theoretical legal arguments are likely to follow the implementation of these new provisions. In the next couple of years, Courts will decide cases that set new precedents in New York. The Equal Rights Amendment, passed 60 years after the Civil Rights Act that created protected classes, does more than just reinforce existing protections–it reminds us that those protections exist in the first place. Maybe people will pay more attention to the potential consequences of forcing job applicants to undergo a DOCCS volunteer application prior to a conditional offer of employment.

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