Global Times - 07.08.2019

20 Wednesday August 7, 2019

LIFE

By Chen Xi

“I

believe that the nature of

human beings is kind, but

the driving force of being

kind needs to be guided, that is

why I want to share this story with

your readers,” Jiang Lan, a teacher

who taught Chinese at a prison in

the US, told the Global Times.

Jiang, a Chinese-Canadian,

became a teacher at Bard College

in New York in 2012 after earning

a PhD in classical literature at the

School of Chinese Language and

Literature, Soochow University in

2009.

She said she was invited to be a

teacher as part of the Bard Prison

Initiative (BPI), a Bard College

program that provides college

opportunities to people in prison,

after inmates submitted a peti-

tion asking that Chinese language

classes be expanded to include

classic Chinese literature.

“My family was against my

choice and worried about my

safety, but I was very curious about

my potential students, and wanted

to go on an adventure,” she said.

Strict environment

According to Jiang, she needed

to go through very strict security

before entering the classroom.

“I was immediately surrounded

by a monotonous and strict atmo-

sphere when I stepped in the door.

The place did not have any green

plants just electric steel fences,

and of course, guards armed with

guns,” she noted.

“But, when I finally met my

students after passing by many

doors, my upset mood was swept

away because they did not match

the evil image that I’ve seen in

movies. Their appearance was not

so different from that of normal

college students

except they all wore

dark green prison uniforms. They

were all seated by the wall in a well-

behaved manner.”

“After calming down, I started

my first class, Intermediate Chi-

nese III. I didn’t have any elec-

tronic equipment, all I had was a

textbook, All Things Considered: An

Advanced Reader of Modern Chinese,

a blackboard and chopsticks,” Jiang

said.

Facing challenges

Jiang said she was not the first

Chinese professor in BPI, so she

had to be familiar with the project’s

Chinese language curriculum and

tie her classes in with those of the

previous Chinese professor.

“My students could read a long

Chinese article well but they did

have some weaknesses, includ-

ing the inability to pronounce the

fourth tone and the lack of basic

knowledge about Chinese charac-

ters.

“I arranged weekly homework

for them, which was to recite Tang

Dynasty (618-907) poems to train

their pronunciation of the fourth

tone and to copy each character of

the poems 20 times to familiarize

them with the structure of Chinese

characters,” she explained.

Reciting the poems proved easy

because the poems rhymed and

the beautiful words inspired the

students to want to explore the true

meaning behind them. Copying

the characters proved difficult,

however, since the task was mo-

notonous and took a lot of time.

“A student named Jared was

opposed to copying the poems.

He did not finish his homework

for almost two weeks. The reason

he gave me was ‘we can still speak

Chinese well without writing such

dull homework.’ I told him that

if he didn’t finish his homework,

there was no reason to come to my

class. Jared got angry but after his

classmates warned him that time

not spent in class had to be spent

in his cell, he came to terms with

it,” Jiang said.

In the end Jared came around,

he even told Jiang that he wanted

to minor in China studies while

talking sociology courses.

“‘Sorry, professor, you are right.

I need to copy the characters so

that I can remember their struc-

ture,’ he said, apologizing to me

somewhat shyly,” Jiang said.

“I was very relieved about

Jared’s progress. According to the

requirements for an undergraduate

degree, students who get an 85 and

above in my class can move on to

the next stage of their studies. This

time, he got a 92,” Jiang explained.

‘Knowledge is power’

In 2015, the program made

headlines after the BPI debate

team defeated Harvard at the Na-

tional Debate Tournament Finals

that year to the surprise of the

whole world.

Jiang said the BRI students were

very hardworking. They had four

Chinese classes a week and each

class lasted three hours. Even then,

the students did not want to rest,

but wanted to learn more.

“I had a student named Brian.

He has muscular dystrophy and

he can not move the fingers on his

right hand very well, but he still

insisted on finishing the copying

homework even though I told him

he did not have to.

“Although they are always seen

as prisoners in the eyes of the

prison guards, us teachers do not

think like that. The diligence of

these students drives me and each

BPI teacher to make every effort

help them learn more, because

knowledge is power,” she said, not-

ing that the recidivism rate of BPI

students released from prison is

zero and many of them have found

jobs.

“‘Everyone makes mistakes.

They do and we do. Definitely,

the mistakes they made are more

serious, but people have a long life,

and I want to give them the chance

to start again,’ one of the investors

of BPI once told me,” Jiang said.

“If I was invited to be a Chinese

teacher again, I would say ‘yes,’”

she added.

 An adventure

of teaching

Chinese in US

prison

Page Editor:

liuzhongyin@

globaltimes.com.cn

Female prisoners look at

lists of books in Campbell

County Jail in Jacksboro,

Texas, on March 20, 2018.

Photo: IC