Paper needed with a plagiarism report if possible

The Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) « March 2009

Bill Muth Thorn Gehring Margaret Puffer Camille Mayers

Sandra Kamusikiri Glenda Pressley

Abstract

One problem with the literature of correctionai education (CE) and prison reform is that

the contributions of African Americans have been generaiiy negiected. This is the first of

three essays that wili begin tofiii that gap. Janie Porter Barrett was an important

Virginia ieader in the period before and after the turn of the 20th century/. She

mobilized funds through the Virginia State Federation ofCoiored Women s Clubs to

estabiish an institution for African American giris outside Richmond, and then became

its first superintendent. Throughout her tenure there. Barrett articuiated and applied

many of the principies that define the modern CE movement. The article indudes a

context for the work of African American reformers as they are (are are not)

represented in the iiterature ofourfieid. a background biographicai sketch on Barrett,

some of the themes of her infiuentiai career in CE and prison reform, and a summary.

The authors learned that the records from Barretts institution became sealed for 100

years in an effort to protect the reputations of persons who had been confined there

during their iifetimes, and they were concerned that this might make information about

Barrett's contributions even more inaccessible. They hope the material they were able

to access wiii attract attention to this exemplary correctional educator, and that others

will carry on with the traditions Barrett stood for throughout her career.

Do precisely the opposite to what is usually done, and you will have hit on

the right plan, (Rousseau, in Quick, 1916, p, 241)

The Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) • March 2009 Janie Porter Barrett Muth, et. al.

Surely, then, if the present system has totally failed, there must be

something radically wrong in it, and it ought to be changed. (Carpenter,

1969/1864, vol. #2, p. 241)

Background

When correctional educators from the United States interact with members of

the same field from other nations, two or three criticisms are often articulated

at the beginning of the conversation, usually in terms much like the following:

"You Americans lock up too many people, and the proportion of African

Americans and other minorities in your prisons is a problem,' and 'Your death

penalty, and its frequency, demonstrate the brutality of your nation.' Often,

despite being engaged in the same field of education, useful dialogue cannot

be pursued until these criticisms are addressed or at least acknowledged. The

criticisms are accurate, especially when our incarceration rates are compared to

other industrialized nations. Visitors to Virginia find too many African

Americans in confinement and other forms of supervision, in South Dakota too

many Native Americans, in California too many Mexican Americans.

However, the same nations that criticize the U.S. for these reasons are

generally guilty of parallel brutalities that sometimes go unnoticed until one

visits their countries and asks about the situation. Minorities are confined in

great numbers in other nations, as well as in the U.S.-the Germans lock up too

many Turks, the Scandinavians and Bulgarians too many gypsies or Roma, the

Canadians too many Inuit and other Native Americans. This probiem is so

pervasive that it might be associated with the human condition, at least at the

current stage of our maturation. Still, no one can successfully argue that

minority incarceration is not a problem in the United States.

This series of articles can be considered a response to large gaps in the

historical record vis-à-vis the education of African Americans in prison and

African American social reformers. The series presents a criticism of past and

current approaches to penology and correctional education (CE). Further,

through the retelling of the stories of exemplary social reformers-who happen

to be African American-the series strives to establish a more balanced

historical perspective by delineating the contributions of these leaders to

broader social reform movements as well as to their immediate communities.

Moving toward a more balanced perspective. This article is part of a series of three that is intended to begin to fill a gap in the literature as it relates to the

historic CE contributions of African Americans and themes related to the

education of African Americans. The series will go backward in time. This first

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The Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) « March 2009 Muth, et. al. Janie Porter Barrett

article introduces the need for the three articles and focuses on the work of Janie Porter Barrett before and after the turn of the 20th century. The second will emphasize the education of the freedmen during the occupation of the Confederacy and after the Civil War, and the role of Hampton Institute. The final article in this series will focus on the denial of education during the slavery time. The authors recognize that three articles will not fill the gap, but they hope they begin the process, and that others will pick up some of the work to fill the gap as well.

The current authors are pursuing this series of three articles not merely because they are critical of past practice and hope to provide a small redress, but also because there are remarkable, inspiring stories and records of important contributors to the field of CE that have been hidden for too long.

A short critique ofthe historical record. It will probably come as no surprise that the literature on CE and prison reform does not systematically treat professional contributions from minority members of the field. Such treatment should be considered in light of the huge proportion of minority students confined in our institutions. Minority voices are needed because, in its efforts to support the education of marginalized people and peoples, the field of CE is itself marginalized.

Part of the CE/ prison reform literature gap problem is related to the disproportionate attention given to deficit approaches to penology-the onus placed on individuals to transform their behavior, attitudes and skills so they can lead law abiding lives after release. This perspective ignores the context in which they are expected to transform. But double standards and oppression are evident historically and in current practice. Evidence suggests that double standards are applied along the lines of gender, ethnicity or minority status, and socioeconomic class (Mauer, 2003).

Correctional education is not exclusively about teaching basic academic and marketable skills. This approach misses the point about citizenship education, which is not only about educating students for citizenship, but also about positioning teachers as role models for good citizenship. Part of the struggle of citizens, and of CE, has always been for equality, democracy, and freedom; against predatory imperialism, racism, war, sexism, and genocide. The need for this may be rooted in the settling of America by displaced persons who were at-risk, persecuted, and convicted-'indentured servants' and others (Ekirch, 1987). Georgia was actually founded as a penal colony, and felons were exiled to all the colonies until the American Revolution. The transportation of offenders was one example of this colonizing displacement. Another was the

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TTie Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) • March 2009 Janie Porter Barrett Muth, et. al.

orphan trains, which were pursued on a huge, international scale to supply

cheap labor (from orphans) to the frontiers of empires.

The historical record is clear: prisons and other confinement institutions

have been part of the brutal underbelly of imperialism, and they fit into

worldwide patterns of exploitation. It would be difficult to maintain that

teachers who are not struggling against brutality are good role models for

citizenship. It would be impossible to maintain that the schools in which

correctional educators work are fostering citizenship if these issues are

neglected in the classroom. Citizenship is a meaningless term if it does not

attend to the struggle against double standards and oppression. Thomas iViott

Osborne asked central questions about our work: "Are you looking for

immediate or for permanent results? Do you believe in [mental] discipline or in

training? Do you wish to produce good prisoners or to prepare good citizens?"

(1975/1912, p. 212; emphases in original). Those questions remain timely—they

provide a context for the gap that this article helps address.

Despite these contexts, the historical record regarding education of African

Americans in prisons has been generally neglected, and when the issue has

been addressed in the record it has been approached superficially. For example,

the records of the Boston Prison Discipline Society report that in 1828 Sing Sing

Chaplain Gerrish Barrett wrote "After prayers I heard a black man read." (BPDS,

1972, vol. #1, p. 211). This was noteworthy because many states then had laws

that provided terrible penalties for slaves who tried to acquire literacy, and even

for Whites who had the courage to teach them.

Another example of this neglect is the 1922 report of the Board of

Directors of Virginia Penitentiary, which included the following: "The median

education of the 182 white inmates is that of a fifth grade in our elementary

schools, and the median education of the 402 negro inmates is that of a

second grade in our elementary schools" (Virginia, 1922, p. 30). That section of

the report was submitted by education advisor Hoke, who also served as

assistant superintendent of Richmond public schools, in charge of education

programs for backward children (p. 22). The Board emphasized the:

first school...organized at the Penitentiary...|lt] had...two classes of approximately fifteen white men in each, under an instructor who was a prison inmate. One class had men of 8 and 9 years and the other men of 10 and 11 years mentality. Attendance in these classes was entirely optional; in fact, it was conditioned on good conduct. These classes were soon followed by two other classes for negro inmates, with optional

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The Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) • March 2009 Muth, et. al. Janie Porter Barrett

attendance. The two groups of white men, as originally organized, are still

[1922] attending instruction. The negro classes have been reclassified. (p. 4)

These two passages, separated in time by about 100 years and in distance

between Virginia and New York, are about all there is in the classic literature on

CE on the education of confined African Americans. In many ways this gap in

the literature corresponds to the gap between our current practice and our

aspirations. Stated alternatively, correctional educators who are alert to these

important themes of the field are concerned that most information has been

inaccessible, an effect that supports and maintains historic patterns of

oppression.

Thus the purpose for this series is twofold: to present stories that serve as counter-scripts to deficit-models of CE prevalent in the literature, and to help fill the gap in the CE/prison reform iiterature related to the education of African Americans in prison and African American social reformers. This first article highlights the contributions of an exemplary African American educator and reformer-Janie Porter Barrett. The following two sections present (a) biographical information about Janie Porter Barrett and (b) thematic glimpses of her philosophy of practice. Both sections borrow liberaiiy from Barrett's own words and reports to summarize her contributions to the fieid of CE and prison reform.

Janie Porter Barrett: A Biographical Sketch

This section is based on Kneebone, et al. (1998), pp. 357-359. BARRETT, Janie Porter (1865-1948), educator, was born in Athens, Georgia, the daughter of Julia Porter, an African American domestic servant and seamstress. The name of her father, who may have been white, is unknown. She grew up in Macon, Georgia, where her mother worked for a northern white woman named Skinner who treated the chiid almost as a member of the family. After Julia Porter married and moved to her own home, Janie Porter remained in the Skinner household. Julia Porter evidently turned down an offer by Skinner to send her daughter north to school, where she might have passed into the white world and left her family forever. Instead, Janie Porter's mother sent her to Hampton Normal and Agricultural Institute, the first of the self heip, vocational training schools for freed people. Porter initially had difficulty adjusting to life in a school whose students largely came from rural backgrounds. In iater years she attributed her desire to serve her fellow African Americans to Sir Walter

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The Journai of Correctional Education 60(1) • March 2009 Janie Porter Barrett Muth, et. al.

Besant's Aii Sorts and Conditions of Men: An Impossible Story, a Utopian novel published in 1882 in which an heiress worked to heip the poor of London, (p, 357)

Janie Porter graduated from Hampton Institute in 1884 and taught for four

years in rural Georgia, In 1888 she attended Lucy Laney s Haines Normal and

Industrial school in Augusta, Georgia, Laney, who had herself graduated from

Atlanta University, 'sought to give a new generation of African Americans a

way to rise in the world by plain living, high thinking, cleanliness, and godliness

coupled with academic and vocational training" (p, 357), By 1889 Porter

returned to Hampton and married Harris Barrett, who had also studied at

Hampton and worked as a bookkeeper and iater became a businessman. They

lived in Hampton and had one son and three daughters' (p, 357), Barrett

founded activities for community girls: one class or club met nearly every

evening or afternoon-sewing, rug weaving, athletics, general gardening, raising

poultry, cooking, parenting ('child welfare"), quiiting, and flower growing. On

their own land, the Barretts constructed a clubhouse, and soon the Locust Street

Social Settlement was established, along the same lines as Jane Addams'

Chicago Hull House,

Locust Street typified the growing number of institutions black people were

creating for themselves, paralieiing similar developments in white society.

Another was the National Association of Colored Women, formed in 1896,

which encouraged local clubs to organize state federations. In 1908 Barrett

helped found the Virginia State Federation of Coiored Women's Clubs, and

she served as its president until 1932, (p, 357)

Barrett was concerned about the terrible conditions in which most African American children were raised, 'She often told of finding an eight year oid giri in jail and becoming convinced of the need for a home for what were then called wayward girls" (p, 358), Under her leadership, the Virginia State Federation of Colored Women s Clubs took up this cause, and Barrett toured the State gathering contributions from its African American communities. In 1912 the National Association of Colored Women held its conference in Hampton, helping to fuel Barretts fundraising initiatives. By 1913 she had gained the support of a number of White Virginia women, 'Barrett always gave due credit to the white women and their clubs, though she recognized the greater constancy of her black supporters" (p, 358), She received technical assistance from the Russell

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The Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) » March 2009 Muth, e t al. Janie Porter Barrett

Sage Foundation, which focused on the influence of women In social

improvements. Eventually more than $5,000 had been devoted to the cause.

That was when her Virginia State Federation of Colored Women s Clubs purchased

a farm in Hanover County just north of Richmond, for the school for girls.

White residents near the proposed site of the school objected, but Barrett

promised to take charge of the school as its first superintendent and to move

it if it proved a nuisance to the neighbors. The objections satisfied, the General

Assembly appropriated $3,000 for the Industrial Home School for Colored

Girls, later the Virginia Industrial School for Colored Girls, and it opened its

doors in January 1915. The Virginia State Federation of Colored Women's

Clubs owned and governed the school, which had a large board of visitors

composed of whites and blacks. During the campaign to raise money, [her

husband] Harris Barren died of a stroke on 26 March 1915. (p. 358)

Janie Porter Barreft intended for the new institution to help girls develop Christian character. Student activities were regulated by the honor system. Using rewards instead of punishments in its programs, she emphasized the facility's role as a home rather than a prison. All activities were aimed at building agricultural and household skills, and cleanliness. Students were expected to work on farms or as domestics until they were able to establish their own homes. The models that had been prototyped at Hampton, and at Tuskegee Institute, were frequently replicated during Barrett's tenure as institutional superintendent. However, her personality was really the "glue" that held the various program elements together.

In the communities, Barreft struggled to 'prevent the exploitation of former students by employers in search of cheap labor" (p. 358). Her success in garnering support from private sources and the Virginia legislature was facilitated by both African American and White women.

The African American banker Maggie Lena Walker also gave generously to the school and organized a Council of Colored Women in Richmond, which took responsibility for such activities as an annual Christmas dinner for the girls and staff. Little by little, the successful school received recognition and praise, (p. 358)

In 1920 the State assumed control of the Industrial Home School for Colored Girls, but Barrett's management continued until her 1940 retirement as

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The Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) • March 2009 Janie Porter Barrett Muth, et. al.

superintendent. In the 1920s the Russell Sage Foundation recognized it as one

of the best such facilities in the nation.

During the 1920s Barrett was active in the Richmond Urban League and

the Virginia Commission on Interracial Cooperation. Regarding voter

preparation as important as institutional programming for girls, Barreft wrote in

1938 that 'voting is a duty as well as a fight' (p. 358). She chaired the National

Association of Colored Women s Executive Board. In 1929 Barreft received the

William E. Harmon Award for Distinguished Achievement among Negroes; in

1930 she was invited to the White House Conference on Child Health and

Protection. After retiring she returned to Hampton. She died in 1948 and was

buried in Hampton s Eimerton Cemetery.

In 1950 the Industrial Home School for Colored Girls was renamed Janie

Porter Barreft School for Girls. Racial integration came in 1965, and

coeducational programming in 1972. In 1977 the institution became Barreft

Learning Center for Boys, and in the early 21 st century it was renovated and

became a correctional training academy.

The next section introduces some CE highlights of Barrett s leadership at

the Industrial School for Colored Girls. The School s Annual Reports, which

Barreft personally wrote, provide a glimpse of her unwavering voice and

dedication to her charges.

Barrett's Approach to Correctional Education: A Compendium of Her Writings

This section draws on Barretts Annual Reports from 1916-1921,1931, and 1939, unless otherwise noted. (References present relevant report years and page|s|.) The reports reveal Barrett's voice as she struggled, schemed, cajoled and otherwise marshaled support and resources for her school, despite, at times, overwhelming odds. These steadfast eftorts are organized under these six headings: Donations, Hardships, School, Inmate Discipline, Release, and Barrett's Comments about Her Own Dispositions. The material is intended merely to introduce these topics-more comprehensive coverage is not possible in a single article. The authors' commentary situates this material in a broader social-historical context within and outside of the CE/prison reform movement and delineates organic connections that both nourished, and were nourished by, Barrett's work.

Donations. Barrett moved comfortably between two worlds. She pursued local African American communities and northern White philanthropists with equal intensity.

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The Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) • March 2009 Muth, et. al. Janie Porter Barrett

The pair of splendid young muies with new harness, the delicious

Christmas dinner, and a pair of new shoes for each girl, given by the

Councii of Colored Women of Richmond, our strongest Federated Ciub,

brought joy enough to last for days. The Federated Clubs of Covington had

a sugar shower just before the sugar shortage was announced |a home

front activity to support the troops during WW I|, and supplied us with

sugar at a time when we could not buy it at any price. At the request of

these women and under the leadership of the public school teachers, the

schooi children of Covington gave a barrel of potatoes. By having each

child bring two or three potatoes this was accomplished without putting

anyone to very great expense. (1918, p.. 12)

Mrs. Falconer...[gave] ten dollars toward a moving-picture outfit, which she

felt would give a pleasure that the giris of the school, who are trying to

improve, ought to have. In a few minutes the audience gave in piedges

and cash one hundred and ninety-five dollars, almost enough money to

pay for the machine. (1920, pp. 10-11)

Our schooiroom was made very comfortable this winter by a splendid large stove, a gift that came to us through Dr. Gregg. This is the first year we have had adequate blackboards. We need maps, more desks, and more school books.(1921, p. 20)

Barrett expressed thanks for '...the barrels of clothing friends send from time to time' (1921, p. 27). Regarding Thanksgiving dinner after a terrible influenza attack at the institution, she wrote that 'When it was all over and everyone had pulled through, I could feel almost glad for our troubles because it revealed so many friends that might not have been discovered' (1919, p. 12). Barrett was even thankful for governmental services that wouid normally be extended to White citizens without reservation. She noted that

The white farm demonstrator for Hanover County, after being appeaied to by our president and others, has consented to come and look us over occasionaiiy and has given our farmer the privilege of writing him for any information he desires, so we are sure that we are going to make real progress now. (1919, p. 15)

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The Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) • March 2009 Janie Porter Barrett Muth, et. al.

Barrett's work was situated in impoverished conditions difticult to imagine

by contemporary American educators, even those that work in marginalized

settings and prisons. (However, they likely typify prison schools in many

developing countries-see, for example, Imhabekhai, 2002). Yet, in its broadest

form, the CE work of Janie Porter Barreft in Virginia can be compared to that of

John Henry Pestalozzi in Switzerland or Anton Makarenko in the Soviet Union

(Gehring & Eggieston, 2006). Barreft emerged on the scene at a time when her

people had almost nothing, as a resuit of hundreds of years of systematic

brutality. Pestalozzi built a CE infrastructure when the Swiss had nothing-after

the terrible brutality of the French Revolution and the Napoleonic Wars;

Makarenko built a Soviet CE infrastructure after the devastation of the

Bolshevik Revolution, World War I, and the Civil War. In other words, the

condition of African Americans, after neariy three centuries in North America,

was as if they had just emerged from an intense, protracted war.

Hardships. Barreft pursued State funding with unequivocal directness a n d - perhaps by today's standards-modesty. At one point Barreft wrote that the

institution had '...aii the modern conveniences except the lighting" (1916, p. 7).

This statement was overly optimistic about the institution. For example, she

later wrote "Our water pipes were frozen for weeks and weeks" (1918, p. 10).

She reiterated the materiai needs of the institution periodicaiiy in her reports.

For exampie, "The rapidly increasing number of girls on parole makes the need

for a parole officer imperative" (1920, p. 15).

Everyone has been obliged to do double work and there has not been one

word of complaint. It is the kind of service that makes faiiure impossible....

It would have been impossible to do what has been done had they |the

Board of Managers] not stood so completely behind me. (1920, p. 23)

We still have a poor farm. I have come to the conclusion that it requires not only rich land but brains to farm successfully and, though I hate to confess it, brains are almost as scarce as hens' teeth among some of our farmerettes and of course the land speaks for itself. (1921, p. 21 ; emphasis in original)

My earnest plea to the Board is that if possibie we get an adequate appropriation...We who are managing affairs in the institution are at a loss to know what to do when it gets too coid for the children to go barefooted

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The Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) ° March 2009 Muth, et. al. Janie Porter Barrett

and shoes must be bought,,,and the children must have at least a sweater;

and finally, when the time comes to open school and no provision

is made to pay a teacher,,.

There has never been a time when our children have had all the clothes

they need for a change. They have always been obliged to wash their

clothes at night in order to have them clean for the next day,,,.

We need school the year round with two iiterary teachers and an industrial

teacher,,,We need more library books. We need a sum set aside to meet

the expenses of visiting the girls and investigating homes,,,We need

transportation for girls,,,We need domestic-science equipment and sewing-

room equipment,,,We need dentai services.

We need-and this is a crying need-mentai tests for our girls. It is very difficult to ascertain whether our girls' failures are their own fault or that of those of us who have paroled them when they have not the mentality to make their own pay,

I should like banjos, guitars, ukuleles, cornet, fife and drum; we need an

orchestra and a drum corps, (1921, pp, 31-33)

After 16 years of operation, Barrett still reported salient needs, 'We still have no cows,,,,I look forward to the time when we can afford whole miik for every girl" (1931, p, 6),

Barrett's running catalogue of needs again reflects the paucity of resources at her disposal, but, as well, her visionary stance (',,,orchestra, drum corps.,,") toward education. This stance is grounded in the Social Settlement Movement that flourished in the last quarter of the nineteenth century in London's East End, and manifested in such social projects as Toynbee Hall and the People's Palace, These university settlements, described in near-utopian terms in Walter Besant's (1903) Aii Sorts of Conditions of Men. epitomized broad liberal, social and civic curricuia, including beautiful libraries, great performance halls, gymnasiums and winter gardens. In 1920 America, the settlement movement also stirred Jane Addams' work at Hull House in Chicago, and social workers in hundreds of other settlement houses throughout the U,S,

School. Barrett's passion for education is reflected in her hands-on oversight of the school. Her exulted notions about the power of clubs as an

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The Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) • March 2009 Janie Porter Barrett Muth, et. al.

extension of the curriculum are based on Besant's (1903) work and her own

successful experiences with social clubs at Locust Street Seftlement House.

A thorough course in domestic science will be given which will include the

care of poultry, vegetable and flower gardens, lawns and anything else

that we find will be needed. Miss Hyde, the lady principal of Hampton

Institute...promised to help us plan this course. (1916, p. 10)

Special activities and clubs included...were: Charm Club, Y-Teens, Junior

Red Cross, Girl Scouts, choir, 4-H Club, Dramatic Ciub, New Homemakers,

Student Councii...Religious Education. (1916, p. 10)

In the Social Settlement Movement, clubs were not merely designed to relieve monotony and the hardness of life among the poorer classes; they provided opportunities for what Wenger (1998) calls communities of practice. On one level clubs provided a communal structure for informal learning, on another, community where pro-social and pro-educational identities were forged and nurtured. In Barrett's day this social learning model was exemplified by the summer program at Shellbanks-the farm at Hampton Institute-where rural African American youth were recruited to live in the dorms for a few weeks, wear the institute's uniform, participate in 4H style projects, and imagine themselves as college students (Brawley, 1939).

Within the largely agrarian program at the Industrial School, Barreft

lobbied, cajoled and advocated for high academic standards and certifications

commensurate with schools for white children. 'We are greatly handicapped

because we have neither school house nor proper equipment. Miss Peterson,

Superintendent of Kilbourne Farm, the school for delinquent white girls, sent us

some of the books that her girls had finished using' (1918, p. 18). "This year we

were fortunate in gefting the State Board of Education to put our school on its

list and...supplied with a literary teacher and an industrial teacher' (1919, p. 12).

She noted:

We still have two sessions a day....If we could have a teacher the year round, the timetaken out of school for planting and harvesting crops and for many other things that have to be done on the farm...could be made up. (1920, pp. 15-16)

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TTie Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) • March 2009 Muth, et. al. Janie Porter Barrett

Our classes are not sufficiently organized and do not cover enough ground

to receive a certificate in cooking and sewing, but we are still working to

this end and we are nearer to it than we were a year ago. In time I hope

there will be a class each year to receive these certificates when we have

our annuai exercises and exhibit |at the County Fair]. It will be the nearest

thing to a diploma that the majority of them will ever receive. (1921, p. 18)

'Without such...lan educational] preparation we must not be disappointed

if they return to a life of crime and shame" (1931, p. 7). 'The industrial

training....equipment is woefully out of date. This lack becomes increasingly

serious as the use of modern conveniences becomes more general.' (1931, p. 9).

Four giris were recommended in May to complete...seventh grade... certificates if they passed both in academic studies and conduct. This they did with credit. Commencement activities were as elaborate as we could aftord....The four girls...[were] placed in homes ...earning wages and saving with the expectation of entering high schooi.... Only a very small percentage...have the ability to take higher academic training. (1931, p. 8)

We continue to paftern our program of academic training after that of the public schools of the State with the idea that, when our charges are returned to society they will be none the worse for the interruption in their attendance at the pubiic school....It is our sincerest hope that funds wiii be forthcoming for the erection of a school building which will meet minimum standards at least. (1939, p. 7)

Barrett was a tireless civil rights advocate. Her quest to give her girls an educationai experience commensurate with White public schools-including commencement ceremonies 'as elaborate as we could afford' presaged contemporary eftorts to bring fully commensurate graduation ceremonies to adult prisoners, even to those who completed Adult Basic Education (McCollum, 1983).

Inmate discipline. The Industrial School program was steeped in the mutual aid and self-help traditions that evolved from the late 19th century Social Seftlement Movement. The Industrial Home Schooi for Coiored Girls employed progressive methods that typified these traditions—such as honor

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The Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) • March 2009 Janie Porter Barren Muth, et. al.

systems-and banned the use of corporal punishment. One proactive way to

diminish bad behavior was to keep the girls busy.

Sunday is such a hard day for the girls to get through without gefting into trouble. They have so much time on their hands, and if I don't give them something to do, Satan will.

Virginia Coftage is used, as was planned, for the reception coftage, each

girl on entering being assigned there and closely observed and studied

from all angles. She is given ten days to learn the rules and regulations,

after which she is marked each day for work, conduct, and personal

appearance. She is then in line to work for the white dress and promotion

to the honor cottage, which is Federation Coftage. Fighting, quarreling,

abusive language, stealing, running away, are all to be overcome before a

girl can receive a white dress, and after the much desired white dress has

been awarded, if she forgets in a fit of temper and goes back to her old

habits, she loses her dress and has to start at the beginning and work for it

again. Knowing this she develops self-controi more rapidly. (1920, p. 13)

If...a girl s behavior is so disgraceful that she has to be locked up in the Thinking Room' she has to wear a brown dress. The activities of the brown-dress girl' must be confined to road...work, which consists of carrying from the gravel pit to the roads on the grounds a...number of bucketsful of gravel which varies according to the nature of her misdemeanor. If her spirit is good she may carry as many as three or four bucketsful at a time in a wheel-barrow or push cart. If her spirit is ugly she has to bring up the gravel a half-bucketful at a time. This gives her all the fresh air she needs to revive her spirits and...lengthens the time she must wear the brown dress. When she is finally permitted to take this off she wears faded and patched uniforms...the dresses allotted to the mistakes and failures.' From this she has to work up again as if she had newly entered the school. (1921, pp. 13-14). The weekly honor roll is a great help. The names of all girls making A in conduct, eftort, and work appear on the honor roll each Monday morning. All girls who get their names on the honor roll are considered the first citizens of our community, and each one of these is permitted to wear a small American flag to the Assembly. (1921, p. 14)

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The Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) « March 2009 Muth, et. al. Janie Porter Barrett

When a girl was promoted to the Student Officers' Corps, designated by a

bar on the right sleeve, she took the following pledge:

I pledge my loyalty to the Virginia Industrial School and to the principles

for which it stands. 1 promise to try to be worthy of the special privileges

granted me. I promise to respect and obey authority; not to steal, or to

allow anyone to steal, if I know it, without reporting it. I promise not to run

away and to report any girl making plans to run away. I pledge to give my

absolute support to the ofticers of the institution in maintaining law and

order. (1921, p. 12)

Barreft cultivated strong civic values in her girls by helping them learn to

govern themselves. Note, again, the elevated use of clubs to create social

spaces where her charges could forge new identities.

So many things that used to have to come before the officers are managed by the girls through their clubs. They serve two purposes: they give an opportunity to the girls to practice the social virtues taught through the moral instruction given; and they are most effective in teaching the girls to obey each other, which simplifies the discipline wonderfully. There are two clubs. The Friendly Girls' Club is made up of honor girls only and its object is, first, to obey the rules, and, second, to be helpful to the ofticers and to each girl in the school, especially the new girls. If one of their members violates a rule or does anything unbecoming she is handled by the club, a thing they very much dread. I heard a girl crying one day as if her heart would break. When 1 asked her what the trouble was, she said that she had been turned out of the club for speaking rudely to the girls when she passed the coats. I asked her if they would not take her back when she got to be polite. She said yes, but that it was a terrible disgrace to be turned out. The True Blue Club, 1 think, takes its name from the blue uniforms. It is made up of the uniform girls who devote their entire energies to self- improvement so that they can become honor girls. Every uniform girl has to be a member of the True Blue Club until she becomes an honor girl, and then her highest ambition is to belong to the Friendly Girls' Club. (1918, p. 23)

The girls elect the head student ofticer but their choice must meet the approval of the entire Staft. (1931, p. 7)

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n i e Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) ° March 2009 Janie Porter Barrett Muth, et. al.

The historian Sol Cohen (1964) characterized the Social Settlement

Movement as 'between old school and new school" (p, 138), Reformers like

Janie Porter Barrett believed that poverty was still the result of sin, sloth and

vice and that a her giris required a large dose of moral reformation. But she

also recognized the social roots of poverty and the need to reform social

structures. Her views are reflected in her discipline practices, which provide swift

penaities for misbehavior but also evoke a sense of trust in the child's capacity

to live a moral life when she is provided heaithy social structures within which

to grow, Barrett's views are simiiar to the seif-governance ideas of Wiiiiam

George (1910), and resonate in the contemporary debates between Michaei

Dyson and Bill Cosby,

Release. Barrett understood the profound needs for continued support after the girls were released from the caring structure of the Industrial Home

School for Colored Girls, Contemporary proponents of the re-entry movement

would do well to ponder the simple-yet radical by today's standards-idea of

continuity of support provided through personal relationships with caring

practitioners,

I keep in touch with the girl by writing as often as I can and the lady to

whom she is paroled sends a report once a month and oftener if the girl

gives any trouble, I encourage the girls to write very fuily about the things

that seem hard to them, if they are hard I write,,,the iadies about them; if

they are not hard, 1 show the girl that she is mistaken. In this way so much

misunderstanding is saved,,,,our girls,,,their complete success depends

upon placing them in Christian homes where they can be helped after

leaving the institution until they are strong enough to stand alone, (1918,

pp, 14-15; emphases in original)

Our plan is not to allow any girl whom we send out to live an immorai life. If she is not self-respecting she must come back untii she can learn to be. This fact braces our girls and makes them try very hard to be respectable, and if they get help and protection in the home to which they go they will not faii, 1 do not believe there are any people in the world more anxious to be respectable than colored girls; when they are given the right standards and are heiped they will make good, (1918, p, 16)

Barrett's vigilance was not limited to the behavior of her students; it extended to their caretakers and the conditions of reiease as well:

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The Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) • March 2009 Muth, et. al. Janie Porter Barrett

We must do something to have the people taking these girls understand

more fully that our Board of Managers insist that they be kindly treated.

Slapping a girl and striking her on the head are out of the question. This

kind of treatment, aside from being absolutely wrong, can do no good, and

will create a condition that will be most difficult to handle. Anyone having

a giri is given the right to bring her back to the school whenever she

ceases to give satisfaction, so there is no need of doing anything rash.

(1920, p. 15)

All...things [that] endear the school to the giris and form ties which hold them in a wonderful way after they leave us [are helpful). 1 want each girl to feel in going out that at the school there are always friends awaiting her when she finds herself in need of help, and who are glad of any success she makes, no matter how littie it may be. (1921, p. 18)

In today's large, overcrowded prisons, we hardly know what to make of Barrett's approach to release. What warden has time to write regularly to her released charges? Yet precious truths are hidden beneath the quaintness of Barrett's reports. Her words remind us of the forgotten potential of institutions to foster relationship, trust and community, and the moral power embedded in the imagined act of answering to a respected other. Barrett's actions provide sharp contrast to our dismally failing Re-Entry systems based on negative expectations and mistrust, impersonal surveillance systems (Foucault, 1975) and bureaucratic Re-Entry structures.

Barrett's comments about her own dispositions. Barreft's life story embodies a voice of determined optimism, commitment, strength. Her 'continuous plea' should not be misunderstood today as a submissive stance. We end this brief study of Janie Porter Barrett with some of her reflections about herself, the school, staft and students, and their collective accomplishments:

...Negro women with human slavery less than seventy years behind them...white women, products of hundreds of years of education and culture, joining hands and working together that the least among them might have their chance. What sacrifice and struggle...of... Negro women who had so little to share; what courage in...white women who laid aside custom and...traditions to champion a cause so unpopular! I wish...their every encourag-ing word and helpful act might be recorded as they burn in

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The Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) « March 2009 Janie Porter Barrett Muth, et. al.

my memory...as a guide to future generations who...contribute to human

betterment. This... stands as a memorial to brave women, white and black,

who forgot their prejudices...overcame...distrust in order that the

underprivileged Negro girl might...]have] an opportunity for training and

develop-ment. The school could not have been built by colored women

alone...not...by white women aione, but together they have given to the

Commonwealth an institution without which its organization for social

welfare would be incomplete. (1939, p. 6)

When we compare our present surroundings with the wilderness in which

our institution had its birth, our unbounded faith in the things we are yet

to accomplish is no source of wonder. The site...was a barren spot indeed:

a baftlefield during the war between the States, and before that an

exhausted tract rendered worthless by unscientific farming. And nothing

had been done to improve the soil since the war. Now the land flourishes.

Trees, flowers, fruits and vegetables bear silent witness to our conquest of

desolation. In the beginning, even more than now, belief in the thing we

wanted to do for the underprivileged girls of our Commonwealth, and in

the way by which we proposed to accomplish this... was the exception

rather than the rule and so money came slowly and in small amounts, and

we had to use every means of extracting the largest possible returns from

the resources at our command....Gradually, as a result of ]our building up

of the land]...the soil regained much of its iong lost fertility. Our hunger for

beauty led us to our woods, from which we transplanted holly, dogwood,

beechnut and sweet gum. (1939, p. 5)

Whenever I leave ]the facility] I ask the Lord to let no harm come to...]the girls]. I feel responsible for these irresponsible children, soul and body...don't want them maiming themselves. (1920, p. 21)

My part in the work of this institution has always been to me a very sacred trust-sacred because the State Federation of Colored Women's Clubs let me persuade them to assume the responsibility of establishing the institution; sacred because of the white friends who worked with us when the cause was less popular than it now is; when their co-operation...did not meet the approval of their friends and was therefore far from an easy task for them; sacred because of the state aid voted by our legislature...though small at first...increased yearly until the

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The Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) ° March 2009 Muth, et. al. Janie Porter Barrett

State...assumed the entire responsibility. So, beneath my continual plea for

adequate support is the earnest desire to keep our institution abreast of

the times...[to! serve in a iarger way in improving the citizenry...and to

build an institution worthy of the friends who have stood by us, and

worthy of our great Commonwealth. (1931, p. 12)

We are left with an aggregate picture of a compassionate, humble, and determined pioneer. Barrett was a social reformer inspired by the Social Seftlement Movement; she possessed an uncompromising sense of social justice and a deep commitment to her students and to her community. She was well aware of the deep racism and segregation in the Jim Crow South of her day, yet believed strongly in the need for collaboration across color lines and moved with ease in both White and Black society. She was, in short, an exemplary correctional educator.

Conciusion

Janie Porter Barreft's Annual Reports for the Industrial Home Schooi constituted a life's work in the service of delinquent African American girls and in the fight against institutionalized racism and Injustice. The State legislature provided State funds to estabiish similar institutions for White girls, and for White boys, but it did not extend this service to African American girls and boys. So Barrett mobilized funds from Virginia's African American communities and from White citizens who found merit in her work. Then the State legislature assumed control of the institution's physical plant and all its programs. Barrett continued in her leadership role, despite this change.

Her tenure at the Industriai Home School for Colored Girls was marked by many hardships; yet her work advances our ideas about CE, inmate discipline, moral education, Re-Entry, and even the expansion and improvement of physical plants and fundraising. The authors hope that this brief portrayal of a pioneering African American correctional educator will help address the gap in the historical record noted at the beginning of this essay.

There Is much in her work that was exemplary, and a few elements that are artifacts of a difterent time. It would be inappropriate for modern readers to apply current standards to her work, because even best practices from one period may not be useful in another period. The CE work of Janie Porter Barreft defied the extreme racial and material barriers of her time. Perhaps her most remarkable accomplishment was the community she provided her vuinerable students-a community that nurtured growth and was inspired by the highest

educational ideals of her age. 49

The Journal of Correctional Education 60(1) • March 2009 Janie Porter Barrett Muth, et. al.

References

Barrett, J.P. (1916). First annual report of the Industrial Home School for Colored Girls.

Peake's Turnout, Virginia: The Virginia State Federation of Coiored Women's Cubs.

Barrett, J.P. (1917). Second annual report of the Superintendent To the president and members of the Board of Trustees. Peake's Turnout, Virginia: The Virginia State Federation of Colored Women's Clubs.

Barrett, J.P. (1918). Third annual report of the Superintendent To the president and members of the Board of Trustees. Peake's Turnout, Virginia: The Virginia State Federation of Colored Women's Clubs.

Barrett, J.P. (1919). Fourth annual report of the Superintendent, To the president and members of the Board of Trustees. Peake's Turnout, Virginia: Ttie Virginia State Federation of Colored Women's Clubs.

Barrett, J.P. (1920). Fifth annual report of the Superintendent To the president and members of the Board of Trustees. Peake's Turnout, Virginia: The Virginia State Federation of Colored Women's Clubs.

Barrett, J.P. (1921 ). Sixth annual report of the Virginia Industrial School for Colored Girls. Formerly the Industrial Home School. Peake's Turnout, Virginia.

Barrett, J.P (1931 ). Sixteenth annual report of the Virginia Industrial School for Colored Girts. Peake, Virginia.

Barrett, J.P. (1939). Report of the Superintendent of the Virginia Industrial School for Colored Girls, for the year ending June 30, 1939. Peake, Virginia.

(BPDS) Boston Prison Discipline Society. (1972). Reports of the Prison Discipline Society of

Boston, 1B26-1B54. IVlontciair, New Jersey: Patterson Smith.

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Biographical Sketches DR. BILL MUTH is an Assistant Professor of Adult and Adolescent Literacy at Virginia Commonwealth University,

DR. THOM GEHRING, is a Professor in the Education, Psychology and Counseling Department, California State University San Bernardino, and Director of the Center for the Study of Correctional Education,

MARGARET PUFFER is a teacher in the Alternative and Correctional Schools Unit of the Orange Co, California Department of Education.

DR. CAMILLE MAYERS, is a Professor in the Education, Psychology and Counseling Department, California State University San Bernardino.

DR. SANDRA KAMUSIKIRI is the Dean of Graduate Studies and Associate Provost for Assessment, California State University, San Bernardino.

GLENDA PRESSLEY directs the statewide education programs in the California Division of Juvenile Justice,

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