Just because they were stupid enough to get caught, doesn’t mean prisoners can’t be smart. As part of a series called “CNN Presents: Black in America,” Soledad O’Brien and Stan Wilson visited San Quentin Prison just north of San Francisco, where the death penalty remains but education is alive and kicking.
 

Naturally, what CNN found were 656 inmates on death row, and, only a few feet away, makeshift classrooms. Wilson described the environment as looking and feeling “more like a community college setting.” Funny, because I always thought Northwestern’s library looked and felt more like a prison.
 

University of California at Berkeley professor Rebecca Carter volunteers for the Prison University Project, a nonprofit that offers incarcerated black men a chance to earn a college degree. Her observations were startling:
 

“I’ve been teaching on the Cal campus and teaching at the prison at the same time, and they were significantly more engaged when I was in the prison,” Carter told O’Brien.
 

Yes, I imagine they would be. When the choices are dropping the soap in the shower or picking up a little extra homework in the classroom, I think the answer is clear.