Taking the prison to the classroom: prison service professionals as guest speakers in Higher Education.

Making a meaningful connection between a criminology classroom and working in a prison is not always easy. As an academic discipline, criminology is concerned with theories, their empirical basis, and their practical application. Degree programmes typically focus on processes of criminalisation and victimisation, the causes, meaning and representation of crime, deviance and harm, and on official and unofficial responses. Among these concerns, the experiences of people working in the criminal justice system (CJS) can be overlooked and when they are considered, with some notable exceptions, the focus is often on the roles of police officers, not prison staff. In this article, we suggest some ways to create and take opportunities for communication between prison staff and students about working in the Prison Service. We argue that taking the prison, or at least prison staff, to the classroom has benefits for both students and His Majesty's Prison and Probation Service (HMPPS). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]