Affinity groups
MiCHEP has organized approximately 150 member-institution personnel into affinity groups of people with similar roles on each member campus. Convenings of these groups are intended to create and deepen relationships between and among people who do similar work on behalf of incarcerated students enrolled in Prison Education Programs (PEPs). These meetings will help the affinity groups problem-solve common problems for the purpose of developing best practices that elevate and expand the educational experiences of Michigan's incarcerated college students.
Academic and Career Counseling
High quality PEPs require the assistance of colleagues who provide academic and career counseling and other critical student success services. While titles of "student success" personnel may vary between institutions, those most vital to the improvement of PEPs will join this group (writing tutors, general academic tutors, student navigators, etc.).
Faculty and Academic Affairs
The faculty are the lifeblood of any PEP. They transmit knowledge, but they also have a powerfully formative influence on students. Involving faculty in helping discern best practices for curriculum development and teaching strategy is an important step in serving MiCHEP students well.
Financial Aid
MiCHEP-member Financial Aid professionals are critical to the financial health of each program. They know the State and Federal financial aid regulations best, and they connect the dollars needed to pay the costs of our students' education to each student's account. They are also crucial in counseling students about their financial aid status and decision-making.
Institutional Research
MiCHEP-member institutions maintain significant databases that track a host of student data. Institutional research colleagues maintain these data repositories and help answer important questions about the student experience. Orienting institutional research personnel to the prison education program and helping extend their work to include our incarcerated students is important, and will grow in importance as prison education programs become normalized.
Instructional Technology
One of the central pillars of MiCHEP's strategic plan commits us to "Develop, implement, and assess technology solutions that support curricular needs of incarcerated college students." This will require cooperation with and among our MDOC partners and the professionals at our institutions who manage the various technologies our students need to learn, research, write, compute, and prepare for life as a college graduate after incarceration.
Librarians
Some MiCHEP librarians (partnered with MDOC librarians and others) have developed standards that elevate the provision of academic research resources, search capability, and information literacy for MiCHEP students. Developing a continuing partnership with librarians is critical to the academic success of incarcerated college students.
Philanthropy, Public Affairs, and Marketing
Long-term flourishing for PEPs will require alternate sources of revenue to safeguard our students' academic progress against inevitable political shifts. We need our institutional fundraisers for this.
Program Directors
Program directors are the professionals closest to the operational realities of running a high quality PEP. No PEP can be successful without an informed, engaged, experienced, and politically savvy program director. Creating a forum for ongoing mutual learning for these professionals is a critical step in supporting students' learning.
Registrars
Registrars occupy positions of significant influence on MiCHEP campuses. They are the "keepers" of the university catalog and "enforcers" of university academic rules and regulations. Registrars ensure that incarcerated students are properly enrolled in courses, and that their transcripts are maintained and distributed according to university policy. They are often the gatekeepers for new or altered courses offered in prison education programs. Properly oriented and communicated with, they can be a powerful ally for PEPs.
Senior Institutional Leaders
The college or university's president and provost are vital to the success of every prison education program. They determine how and if the PEP fits into the institutional strategic plan. Including them is an essential component of building and maintaining a healthy PEP ecosystem.
Student Development
Student development focuses on the holistic growth and well-being of students, encompassing not just academic learning but also personal, social, and professional development. It recognizes that students are not merely receiving information, but actively shaping their identities, values, and skills through their college experience. These professionals often direct co-curricular activities, student government, and social and emotional support services — all integral to an incarcerated college student's learning.
