ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the role of others, as well as the role played by an individual prison's culture, regime and policies, in assisting or discouraging the students' studies and further influencing their sense of self. Distance learning within prison presents a unique set of challenges above and beyond those experienced by other prisoner-students and distinct from those experienced by other distance learners. Even the most committed students in prison may face difficulties that severely test their motivation. Although a campus' based programme is fundamentally different to a distance learning-based programme where students may only be loosely associated with other learners, academic-based interactions between students can nevertheless take place. Some of the distance learners report creating informal self-help groups to assist each other with their work. The chapter concludes by considering the influence that the students themselves can have on their prison environments and by considering how they contribute to creating a culture supportive of learning and constructive activity.
