ISCC EDUCATION DEPARTMENT OVERSEEN AND ADMINISTRATED BY INMATE IN ABSENCE OF ADMINISTRATIVE STAFF

In a disturbing trend, the ISCC has once again given an inmate the ability to oversee, grant privileges to, and even discipline other prisoners, citing as their justification, staff shortages.

In late 2022, Jason Boyd, Education Manager and longtime employee and second-in-command of the Robert Janss School District at the ISCC transferred to another facility. In December, the school principal David Mehlhaff retired from the school district which is comprised only of IDOC education and vocational training classes, leaving only classroom educators at the state's largest prison.

Though the remaining academic teachers and vocational instructors at the facility have their own duties, two of the instructors are said to be "filling in" for the vacant administrator positions, though the only person left to fulfill the day-to-day duties of the two former administrators is actually the (education department) inmate clerk. Indeed, this clerk has been granted the authority to oversee inmate payroll, the enrollment and dropping prisoners into and from classes, authorize/deny/remove inmates access to laptop computers and tablets - even to hire other prisoners for official and unofficial teachers' aid positions (so they can move up the list to receive a laptop).

Additionally, the inmate clerk has and maintains access to education department records of other prisoners, including classes, housing/job assignments, [placement] test scores and other data typically exempt from disclosure even to the general public (much less to another inmate). Even records which are necessary for prisoner students to receive nationally recognized certifications (such as the National Center for Construction Education and Research - NCCER) may be accessed, reviewed and manipulated by the inmate clerk as part of his daily routine and authority.

Ironically, the IDOC actually prevents prisoners from obtaining or knowing information/identities of other prisoners, even to the point of disallowing and denying access to (legal research) case law (see IDOC SOP 402.02.01.001 §4).

Although a staff administrative assistant has been assigned to a desk in the education department office, this person is in no other manner associated with the ISCC education department, rather, [she] performs her normal duties in the education area to allow the inmate clerk access to the area, and to facilitate virtual court hearings and legal conferences sometimes conducted in the office.

While staff will surely object to the characterization that this inmate is acting on his own authority by stating that the two staff instructors filling in for the open administrator positions are actually running the show through their "supervision" of the inmate clerk, for all practical purposes (which might someday require justification to someone somewhere) the inmate clerk runs the place - and if you don't believe it... just ask him.