Taking a stand for STEM

While many incarcerated Americans can access educational programs, STEM [science, technology, mathematics] education pathways are scarce.

This shortage prevents individuals who are incarcerated from entering the STEM workforce. In addition, inequitable and exclusionary systems reinforce limited access to STEM education and careers for many once they are released from prison, according to STEM Opportunities in Prison Settings [STEM-OPS]

STEM-OPS will host its first national conference in St. Louis Oct. 25-27, 2022, at the Marriott St. Louis Grand Hotel, and state Sen. Brian Williams will offer the conference’s keynote address at 10 a.m. Wednesday.

STEM-OPS is a member of a National Science Foundation alliance which includes the Education Development Center (EDC); Prison to Professionals (P2P); Operation Restoration (OR); the Initiative for Race, Research, and Justice at Vanderbilt University; and the Prison Teaching Initiative at Princeton University.

Access to STEM jobs is not equal for everyone. Over the past 25 years, prison education programs that teach STEM skills have been cut, effectively preventing individuals who are incarcerated from entering the STEM workforce after they have served their sentences. The lack of investment in prison education is evidence that systemic racism continues to shape educational and economic realities in the United States.

Several sessions will be led by people who are justice impacted, including Syrita Steib, founder of New Orleans based Operation Restoration, a nonprofit that supports women and girls impacted by incarceration.

“I have an obligation to dismantle systems that were never built for us. The reason I do what I do is for those I left behind,” she said.d

In 2000, 19-year-old Steib was convicted for stealing cars and burning down a car dealership in Texas. She was sentenced to 10 years in federal prison, 20 years in state prison, and $1.9 million in restitution. She was released in 2009.

Steib’s arrest and conviction interrupted her interest in education, which included a full scholarship to Xavier University in physics and engineering.

“School was one thing that I really excelled in so when I got arrested, When I got out, I just knew I needed to go back to school,” she said.

She graduated from LSU Health and Science Center in 2014 but initially struggled to get into college. She helped pass the ‘ban the box’ bill in 2017 so colleges and universities won’t ask applicants about their criminal history.

She completed her prison sentence, but still the staggering restitution amount.

During one of his final days in office, former President Trump pardoned Steib, which eliminated her debt. 

Also on the conference agenda are action items including:

• Launching and leading STEM college-in-prison programming.

• Establishing mentoring, internships, and other supports for currently or formerly incarcerated students in STEM fields.

• Supporting for inclusive hiring of justice-impacted individuals in STEM careers

• Ensuring that the voices of justice-impacted individuals are present among STEM educators, professionals, and scholars.

• Building strategies to strengthen pedagogy and instruction for STEM college-in-prison programs and to disrupt the K–16 school-to-prison pipeline.

STEM-OPS is also dedicated to creating more inclusion and diversity among STEM professionals.

“Diversity in STEM is certainly an equity issue. The culture of STEM education and careers has been historically exclusionary despite efforts to change this. However, the lack of diversity hurts STEM as well. Many brilliant individuals are excluded from its practice who could contribute significantly to STEM progress as well as change the culture,” according to STEM-OPS.

“These brilliant people bring different experiences, values, and understandings in STEM that could lead to new questions being asked and new solutions being developed to profound challenges we face as a society and world. By excluding access to STEM, we are not only inflicting harm on many invaluable individuals in our society, but we are also limiting the potential of STEM disciplines.”