BC Prison Education Program holds third graduation ceremony
In the spring of 1998, when Carlos Maldonado was still a teenager, he visited Boston College for the first time. Entering the Chestnut Hill campus as an inner-city kid “was like stepping into a parallel universe I didn’t know existed,” he recalled, “and it made me dream. I flirted with the notion that I, too, could go there and graduate.”
Life didn’t turn out the way Maldonado expected. In 2007, he was convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison without parole. He has spent nearly two decades behind bars at the Massachusetts Correctional Institution in Shirley, Mass., and will likely never be free. But in 2021, on his second try, Maldonado was accepted to the Boston College Prison Education Program (PEP), which offers college-level courses to incarcerated students at MCI-Shirley. And earlier this week, Maldonado stood behind a podium under a tent in the prison yard, addressing a small crowd as a valedictorian and Boston College graduate.
“I’m here to say thank you,” he said. “Thank you to the BC faculty for thinking that being men and women for others means going to places most people never think about…for proving that prison can be more than a place of punishment and physical confinement. I’m a witness that dreams can come true.”
Maldonado was one of five graduates to receive BC diplomas during Monday’s ceremony at MCI-Shirley, which was attended by BC administrators and faculty, family and friends, Department of Correction staff, and nearly two dozen current and former PEP students. For the third straight year, a brass band played ‘Pomp and Circumstance’ as the graduates filed into the tent, which was decorated with maroon and gold flowers.
“These are really special times for us,” said Massachusetts Department of Correction Commissioner Shawn Jenkins. “This graduation shows what is possible with collaborations between partners.”
Scenes from the ceremony
Since 2019, the PEP has grown from a small cohort of 16 incarcerated men to the largest B.A. degree prison education program in the state, serving more than 130 students at both MCI-Shirley and MCI-Framingham, a medium-security women’s prison. Twelve students have now graduated behind bars, while 20 more have continued their education on campus at BC’s Woods College of Advancing Studies following their release, including three who went on to finish their degrees at Chestnut Hill.
PEP students take a mix of liberal arts and modern business courses with some of Boston College’s leading faculty, including Woods College Dean and Professor of Psychology David Goodman, who addressed the graduates on Monday.
“My favorite people in the world are individuals who have lived extraordinarily challenging lives, who could easily use the excuse of the ways that the world has crushed them under life-depleting circumstances, but who instead remain voracious in their desire to learn and grow,” he said. “Yes, I am telling you that you are some of my favorite people in the world. Your desire for and investment in learning is a source of radical hope in a world that desperately needs it.”
In addition to coursework, PEP students can take advantage of office hours, tutoring sessions, and extracurricular activities. This fall, the PEP partnered with the DOC and the Alliance for Higher Education in Prison to launch a paid internship program at MCI-Shirley, the first in the state. Two PEP graduates will be the inaugural recipients, earning $25 per hour as DOC employees while gaining valuable professional experience to support their education.
At the commencement ceremony, all five graduates came forward to receive their diplomas, shaking hands with Goodman, Winston Provost and Dean of Faculties David Quigley, and Ignacio Chair and PEP Program Director Patrick Conway. Graduate Ludner Imbert was presented with the Social Justice & Community Impact Award, and used his turn behind the podium to recite a poem and present a piece of original artwork to PEP supporters. Jeb Daly received the Excellence in Liberal Arts Award, and described how his philosophy courses had given him a newfound sense of intellectual freedom.
“Keep asking questions,” he told his fellow graduates. “You can’t change where you are but sometimes you can change what you see from there.”
Conway, who has led the PEP since 2021, addressed each of the five graduates individually in his remarks, and praised their “quiet commitment” to pursuing higher education while incarcerated.
“These five have never needed to make a lot of noise about what they were doing,” he said. “They have simply kept doing the work.”