Ron McMillan's Blog
Toe by Toe ‘Behind Bars’
Toe by Toe ‘Behind Bars’
The daily newspaper in my Central Scotland home town covers the issue of crime in the community with a degree of virulence that surely constitutes preaching to the choir. Those convicted of crimes against its (invariably ‘tragic’) reader victims are roundly condemned as ‘evil’, and are not jailed, but ‘caged’ and put ‘behind bars’, never mind that it is decades since there were bars on British jail cells.
These are times when the people in our prison system are hardly flush with public concern for their welfare or rehabilitation, and jail terms are roundly mocked for their brevity, an issue with which I at least partly sympathise.
But when public concern for the overall situation – one which sees Britain with by far the highest (adjusted for population) number of inmates of any nation in Europe – embraces national apathy, then perhaps we ought to have a look at ourselves, and at some of the reasons behind the tens of thousands of souls languishing ‘behind bars’.
Britain has a prisoner population of over 83,000 inmates and growing, and with 64% of prisoners re-convicted within two years of being released, our recidivism rate is among the world’s highest. Successive governments have for decades overseen continuously growing prison populations place an ever-greater burden on the taxpayer until today it costs £40,000 a year to keep a single prisoner incarcerated.
So I was astonished and humbled to hear about two octogenarian trailblazers who, through their Shannon Trust and at a cost of a mere £70 per trainee (and that privately-funded), give hundreds of British inmates a vital leg-up that might help them break that recidivism cycle.
By teaching them to read and write.
The numbers of Britons whose lives are blighted by illiteracy are not just startling, but shameful. A quick search on the Web turns up frightening figures:
• 7 million British adults have a reading age below that of an average 11-year-old, but in prison it is worse:
• 68% of prison inmates have a reading age of 8 years or younger
• 48% of prisoners have no useful literacy skills whatsoever
Put the above together with the fact that 90% of jobs advertised require basic literacy skills, and the fact that nearly two-thirds of prison inmates re-offend takes on a new light.
Retired schoolteacher Keda Cowling (who over many years devised her own ‘phonic’ teaching system for children with severe dyslexia) and author Christopher Morgan (who helped set up the Shannon Trust) organise one-on-one schooling within the prison system that every year helps inmates face up to and fight the stigma of illiteracy.
The system involves mentors from among the prisoner population delivering daily, twenty-minute training sessions to ‘mentees’. This not only avoids security issues involved in groups of inmates congregating, but also allows students to avoid public classroom environments that their inabilities make daunting. The potential for raised spirits and improved self-esteem is plain, and mentees who improve their literacy shortcomings are among the most likely to embrace further educational opportunities both in and out of prison.
The process is a slow one, taken not one step at a time, but ‘one toe at a time’, so Keda calls her system (and the best-selling, self-published book she wrote about it) ‘Toe by Toe’.
The Shannon Trust’s work has been ongoing since 1997, and after a slow start has even succeeded in winning over the normally conservative Prison Officers Association; today Toe by Toe is found in almost every prison in England and Wales, and its supporters are growing in number and in their vocal support:
“The best thing to happen in the prison service in 10 years.” – Prisons ombudsman, Stephen Shaw
“Maybe the one thing that makes a difference.” – Best-selling author, J.K. Rowling
“The change in the guys I see is overwhelming…I see withdrawn men change to confident men. I would like to say thank you for all the lives this is changing – and that includes mine.” - Prison Officer, Bullingdon Prison.
The Shannon Trust is always on the look-out, not just for donors both private and corporate, but for volunteers to help with training schemes at prisons throughout the country. Further information is available here:
Information on Keda Cowling’s Toe by Toe approach to treating dyslexia, which achieves ever-growing success not only in Britain but as far away as North America, Singapore, Australia and New Zealand, can be found at the following websites:
More information on dyslexia is available at the British Dyslexia Association website.