First class in Valley State Prison to lead to bachelor’s degree

June 9, 2021

Valley State Adult School students attend class via a livestream.

History is being made in Chowchilla as Valley State Prison offers the first class to lead to a bachelor’s degree.

The effort is part of the Youth Offender Rehabilitative Community program. Working together, the Valley State Adult School (VSAS) and California State University, Fresno (CSU-Fresno) launched this groundbreaking course.

Taught by Dr. Emma Hughes of CSU-Fresno, “Criminology 120, Juvenile Delinquency” is the first class inside the prison leading to a bachelor’s degree. It is the first of what is hoped to be many as the two schools work towards a matriculated bachelor’s degree program.

Due to COVID-19 restrictions, the class of 25 students had to be split into two to allow social distancing.

Furthermore, since outside guests were not allowed on grounds, Hughes taught the class via remote video. This was another first for VSAS students.

Of course, this necessitated VSAS staff to be on hand to set up the call and supervise the classroom. Nely Llanos and Denette Zaninovich, two VSAS teachers, volunteered to flex their schedules to facilitate these classes.

Students had to meet CSU-Fresno requirements to be admitted as an upper-division transfer student. This meant they completed a minimum of 60 semester (or 90 quarter units) of transferable coursework. They also needed an overall college GPA of at least 2.0 and be in good standing at the last college or university attended. Lastly, they also had to meet CDCR’s requirements by remaining disciplinary free.

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