Administration

Communications

“Corrections” course takes C-SC students behind prison walls
Wednesday, October 05, 2011

CANTON, Mo. – Students in Culver-Stockton College’s “Corrections” course stepped outside the classroom for an inside look at Iowa’s Department of Corrections. Nearly a dozen students recently toured the Iowa State Penitentiary in Fort Madison as part of the course, which aims to give students a better understanding of the field of corrections as well as a theoretical, ideological, sociological and philosophical foundation of the corrections systems.

“The Iowa State Prison tour allowed our students in the “Corrections” class to experience first-hand the operations and environment in an actual maximum security state prison,” explains David Carrothers, C-SC senior lecturer in Criminal Justice. The experience also provided students the opportunity to meet and speak with Warden Nick Ludwick, who guided them as they toured the facility. The Iowa State Penitentiary is the oldest prison west of the Mississippi River and one of only two maximum security prisons in Iowa. “Fort Madison State Penitentiary is always a very exciting visit; under the right circumstances of course,” said Luke Barton, junior criminal justice major from Canton, Mo. “I have worked as a corrections officer in a jail for about two years, so I love going to different prisons to see how they operate. Fort Madison, being a maximum security prison, looks and feels like it is operated as medium security prison. The way the prison is built and its architecture is magnificent,” Barton continued.

The students will also tour a women’s correctional facility in Missouri in mid-October.

Photo: C-SC “Corrections” students in front of the Iowa ISP sign (in order left to right): Rachel Dixon, Marques Stevenson, Dallas Spurgeon, Warden Nick Ludwick, Cameron Johnson-Taylor, Kayla Obert, Mike Camargo, Shawn Rogers, Josh Gustad, Tessa Oilar, and Luke Barton.