Aquaponics Prison Certificate Program Set To Grow
The Aquaponics Association developed and is implementing an aquaponics training and certificate program for prison residents. The Program has graduated its first round of participants in Texas and will expand to prisons nationwide.
The team that implemented the project include Mac McLeon, Vocational Instructor for the Windham School District in Texas; Sam Fleming, Executive Director of aquaponics nonprofit 100 Gardens; and Kate Wildrick, Aquaponics Association Director of Community Aquaponics.
The Goals of the Aquaponics Prison Program
The Aquaponics Prison Program is intended to reduce recidivism by giving prison residents career skills and self-confidence; improving STEM education; and improving nutrition. Recidivism is affected by education and job skills. Some statistics find that up to 60% of prison residents enter prison without completing secondary education and up to 80% lack significant job experience.
Aquaponics can bring job skills to assist residents upon their release. Students develop skills that can be applied to careers in food production, horticulture, food safety, construction, landscaping, and plumbing.
What Do Students Learn in the Program?
The curriculum for the aquaponics course is based on the UN FAO’s Small-scale Aquaponic Food Production textbook. Students must pass a five section test to achieve the aquaponics certificate.
Aquaponic skills that the residents learn include:
Water quality management and data analyzation
Weighing fish and tracking fish growth
Humane harvesting of fish, fish processing, and culinary preparation
Weekly starting of seeds for plant production
Weekly harvesting and selling of leafy green vegetables
Plumbing repair
Inventory management
Aquaponics system design
CEA Greenhouse management
HVAC systems for CEA greenhouses
Artificial lighting for CEA greenhouses and indoor environments
Sales and marketing
The First Course in Texas
The Program was first conducted in the Windham School District of Texas by Vocational Instructor Mac McLeon. In this context, aquaponics was about one-quarter of a larger Urban Farming Course. Other topics in this Urban Farming Course were landscaping, food safety, and greenhouse management. The total Urban Farming Course in Texas is 380 to 460 hours and the students need to pass 19 different tests, including five on aquaponics. In addition to the full Urban Farming Certificate, graduates also received a dedicated aquaponics endorsement.
In the Texas class, students trained on a basic two bed “chop system”, as well as a small commercial system with two deep water culture beds and a media bed. Goldfish are the predominant fish in the systems and lettuce and herbs are the main produce. The lettuce and herbs are donated to the prison and allow for campus-wide fresh salads!
The Program in Texas not only teaches students vital skills, it also assists the Texas Department of Criminal Justice with fresh produce and herbs.
Current Status and Future of the Aquaponics Prison Program
In Texas, the first students have already successfully passed the aquaponics course and received their Certificate of Endorsement from the Aquaponics Association.
Currently, the Program is only being implemented in Texas at the Michael, Boyd, Daniel, Roach, and Mountain View prison campuses. Mac and Sam are working together on developing a specific prison-based curriculum for future iterations of the Course.
The Goal is to spread the Aquaponics Prison Program to other prisons across the nation to help prison inmates build healthy lives and expand the reach of controlled-environment agriculture.
If you have any questions about the Aquaponics Prison Program, email us at community@aquaponicsassociation.org.
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