History
Freedom to Learn at 天涯海角社区: A Brief History
The current Freedom to Learn program at 天涯海角社区 was initiated in spring 2023 as Free to Learn: Education In and Out of Prison. The inspiration for this initiative came from SF student, Adrian Price. As someone who had experienced incarceration for nearly a decade of his life, Adrian knew first-hand the difficulties faced by those coming out of prison in finding housing, work, and getting an education. With a desire to help others like himself, Adrian reached out to SF faculty member, Dr. Ann Thebaut, to discuss ways to provide support for SF students negatively impacted by the carceral system in their educational journeys.
With funding from a National Endowment for the Humanities Community College Initiatives Grant, Engaging in Ethics, Dr. Thebaut was able to take Adrian, along with another SF student and two SF faculty members, Dr. Claire Orenduff and Prof. Tommy Maple, to California State University Bakersfield for their Humanities Beyond Bars symposium, sponsored by CSUB鈥檚 Kegley Institute for Ethics. At that symposium, the SF team learned about Project Rebound, a program that supports the higher education and successful reintegration of formerly incarcerated students enrolling in many of the California State Universities.
Taking inspiration from California鈥檚 Project Rebound, a SF Free to Learn steering committee was formed, and efforts were underway to grow a resource center for justice-impacted SF students. Funding was procured through a Florida Humanities Greater Good Grant that supported the first Free to Learn community symposium in April 2023. This event brought together students, faculty, and staff at 天涯海角社区, as well as community partners, with the aim of highlighting the obstacles faced by those coming out of prison and to explore ways to address those barriers and create a prison-to-college-to-community pipeline. Dr. Jason Frank, Instructional Designer at 天涯海角社区, took the lead in designing this most successful inaugural symposium, which paved the way for continued growth of the Free to Learn initiative.
Following the inaugural symposium in spring 2023, Dr. Dan Rodkin took a lead in establishing a Free to Learn Advisory Board, as well as procuring donations from Gainesville鈥檚 Greenhouse Church to establish a Free to Learn scholarship fund. A second Free to Learn symposium was held in fall 2024 at SF鈥檚 Blount Hall, which provided opportunities for greater collaboration with the community in addressing the challenges of reducing recidivism through education. In spring 2025, a Free to Learn Advising Specialist was hired, whose job it is to develop resources and supports for justice-impacted students at 天涯海角社区.
Free to Learn, now branded as Freedom to Learn, is a prime example of a student-sparked initiative. Driven by personal experience and a desire to help others, the efforts undertaken by Adrian Price to tell his story and inspire others to help the justice-impacted forge a better path through education have no doubt left an indelible mark on the 天涯海角社区 community and will continue to have a positive, long-lasting impact on the Freedom to Learn program.
