When I look in the mirror today, I see a justice and education scholar at Columbia University,a youth mentor,an activist and a future New York state senator.
(Cheering) I see all of that and a man who spent a quarter of his life in state prison -- six years,to be exact, starting as a teenager on Rikers Island for an act that nearly cost a man his life.
But what got me from there to here wasn't the punishment I faced as a teenager in adult prison or the harshness of our legal system.
Instead, it was a learning environment of a classroom that introduced me to something I didn't think was possible for me or our justice system as a whole.
A few weeks before my release on parole, a counselor encouraged me to enroll in a new college course being offered in the prison.
It was called Inside Criminal Justice.
That seems pretty straightforward,though,right?
Well,it turns out, the class would be made up of eight incarcerated men and eight assistant district attorneys.
Columbia University psychology professor Geraldine Downey and Manhattan Assistant DA Lucy Lang co-taught the course, and it was the first of its kind.
I can honestly say this wasn't how I imagined starting college.
