The “Under the Hood” project for residents at the Point Blanche Prison and Miss Lalie Centre (see related story) seems a worthwhile effort. Inmates took part in a range of creative activities under the first phase, which concluded after two months.
The initiative brought local and international volunteers together to establish activities aimed at encouraging creativity, reading and skills development within the two facilities. Among these were two newsletters “Jungle News” at Point Blanche and “The Rascals News” at Miss Lalie, published every two weeks to provide a platform for sharing information and allow residents to contribute content, including puzzles and word games.
At Point Blanche Prison, volunteers also established “Between the Bars”, a book club developed in collaboration with the St. Maarten Library to support literacy. They thus contributed to the establishment of a new satellite library at the prison, helping to renovate the space, organise its collection and sort books donated through the St. Maarten Development Fund (SMDF).
“The Spot” is a movie club where participants watch films on selected themes before taking part in group discussions and writing reviews. Residents also participated in photography workshops, painting, colouring, blackout poetry and podcasting. Cooking activities were organised, while volunteers and residents worked on preparing applications for future projects to help sustain programmes within the facilities.
The second phase started on October 9, with a new group of international volunteers continuing existing initiatives and introducing new ones. The project is being implemented under the Detention Sector Reform Program (DSRP), with funding from the European Solidarity Corps (ESC), the Ministry of Justice of St. Maarten and the Government of the Netherlands. It is delivered in partnership with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC).
Some find these activities rather frivolous, considering that the regard sentenced persons paying their dues to society. Serving time to do so should not be a pleasant experience, they argue.
Perhaps, but rehabilitation and re-socialisation can make a big difference in terms of preventing convicts from becoming repeat offenders and so-called revolving door criminals, particularly in the case of young delinquents. Not having them in-and-out of detention saves society both trouble and cost.
