THE ODDS COUPLE
DePaul hopes the gamble on Dave Leitao pays off like it did for Doug Bruno 30 years ago as a new season approaches. See basketball preview inside
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Volume #100 | Issue #8 | Nov. 9, 2015 | depauliaonline.com
Photo courtesy of DAVID LEVENTI
The Stateville Correctional Center in Joliet, Illinois is designed as a panopticon, which allows prison guards to see the cells of inmates at all times.
I
Learning in lock-up
t’s a Friday afternoon in northeast Illinois, and 30 students gather for three hours to discuss their latest assigned Michel Foucault reading. A DePaul professor presides over the discussion and instructs the class to continue in small groups. Middle-aged men in uniform and mostly young women dressed in business attire begin to collaborate, their minds on their work, far from the 40foot wall that surrounds the setting of their educational experience — Stateville Correctional Center, a maximum-security state prison. In this moment, those who live on the inside and the DePaul attendees who are free to leave have the same status: students. Inside-Out is a prison-exchange program that allows university students and inmates to learn together, from professors and from each other. The program began at Temple University in Philadelphia in 1997. Kimberly Moe, a philosophy professor who began the program at DePaul in the spring of 2012, said the curriculum is student-centered and discussion and activity-based. So far, three courses have been made available at DePaul for students of all majors and chaplainapproved inmates to take: CSS 310 (Restorative Justice), CSS 311 (Masculinity, Justice, and Law), and CSS 312 (Law and the Political System). DePaul is one of only two colleges in the state of Illinois to
STORY BY MADELINE BUCHEL Contributing Writer participate in the program, which is expanding from Stateville to Cook County Jail this academic year. To become a student in one of the classes, anyone interested must email Moe and set up an interview. All professors who taught the course emphasized the importance of any interested students not being voyeuristic. John Ziegler, who taught the course on masculinity and is the Director of the Egan Office of Urban Education and Community Partnerships at the Steans Center, said authenticity is essential for ideal candidates; students who desire to take the class should be fearless and inquisitive.
Christina Rivers, a political science professor who will be teaching the course on law in the spring, said she is looking for introspective and flexible students. All students are subjected to a background check and complete extensive paperwork to be allowed access to the prison. Once a student goes to Stateville in a volunteer capacity, he or she can’t go as a visitor, and vice versa. “When I’m sitting in that classroom, I sometimes forget that I’m sitting in a prison,” Griffin Hardy, a senior Catholic studies major who works with Sr. Helen Prejean and is a current student in Moe’s Restorative Justice course, said. Moe said the prisoners tell her they forget they’re in prison as well.
See PRISON, page 8
Arena funding making progress By Matthew Paras Editior-in-Chief
DePaul Athletic Director Jean Lenti Ponestto said Friday that DePaul has made progress in fundraising and selling premium seats to season ticket holders for the university’s planned arena in the South Loop. Lenti Ponsetto said DePaul hired the sports marketing firm Legends Sports Marketing to help secure naming rights and corporate sponsorship. The group was in contact with
DePaul as many as 18 months ago, but Lenti Ponsetto said the marketing firm signed a contract in the summer. Lenti Ponsetto added that the university has raised $7.5 million of their expected $20 million from fundraising. “Our fundraising at this point, we’re making really good strides,” Lenti Ponsetto said. “We’re at $7.5 (million) and we’ve been very quiet on that. We haven’t gone too public on that. We’re excited about that.” The total cost of the arena for DePaul will be $82.5
million. The university has always said that they will pay their portion through naming rights, corporate sponsorships, ticket sales and fundraising. DePaul will also soon have a preview center with updated renderings and a scaled-down 3D-model of the arena for potential corporate sponsors, season ticket holders and even students. At an open-scrimmage for men and women’s basketball in late October, updated renderings
Photo courtesy of DEPAUL ATHLETICS
The new DePaul arena, located at Cermak and Indiana, is scheduled to open
See ARENA, page 27 in the fall of 2017. DePaul has raised $7.5 million in fundraising for it.