Roberto Luca was 16 when he was sentenced to 15 years to life in prison. Two decades into his sentence while in solitary confinement at Pelican Bay State Prison, he had an epiphany about the pain he caused his victims and he vowed to improve himself. He began by working on his GED in solitary confinement. I was 35 years old and didnât even know fractions, he said. I had zero education.
Getting an education behind bars isn t new. Correspondence programs have a long history, especially for GEDs. But in 2014, California passed SB 1391, which funded face-to-face classes inside prison walls. That s when Bakersfield College began a pilot program at Kern Valley State Prison in Delano.