Of the 26 college students who teamed up this semester to participate in Wednesday’s debate over the issue of gun control at the Coyote Ridge Corrections Center, only half boarded the bus at the end of the day to make the long drive back to Washington State University in Pullman. The remaining 13, enrolled on-site in programs offered through Walla Walla Community College, instead rejoined the inmate population of the all-male correctional facility.
For the undergraduates from WSU – juniors and seniors working on majors within the Department of Criminal Justice and Criminology – the trek to Coyote Ridge was the fourth and final one of the semester. And while second amendment rights may have served as the focus for their debate, most of the Criminal Justice students were drawn to the experience primarily for the opportunity to develop something more than an abstract notion about the realities of working within the corrections system.