For most college students, with every first greeting or new acquaintance comes the question: “What is your major?” Often times, the expected response (or maybe it would be more accurate to say the desired response) consists primarily of science based practices such as medicine or engineering or chemistry. As a result, whenever someone asks me “What is your major?” there exists in me some curiosity as to how they will take the disappointing news. “I am a Social Work major.” Very few people have heard this exclamation and looked at me with sincerity or responded with an encouraging word. Most times, the response is one of confusion or possibly even of concern. “Why would a smart kid like Sam waste his life with such a ‘lowly’ career?” If the conversation manages to not turn into the whole, handing out freebies to lazy people, then someone might ask me what type of work I want to be doing in which I often respond that I want to help people who don’t have the resources to help themselves. I want to help those who have drawn the short stick get to a point of opportunity. It is at this point that some of the confusion washes off their face and then begin to understand what social work really is.

At this point the conversation might continue to persist and perhaps someone will ask me if I have an internship. This is another point of excitement for me because I now get to observe their response when I tell them that for part of my internship I go to prison. Now I have noticed that people have a variety of responses for this one. Sometimes they might be surprised, or might be curious, but most of the time they respond in such a way that communicates fear for me. As if I am putting my life on the line for this undergraduate level internship. But the reality is that my time spent in juvenile correctional facilities are far from risky.

Just as there is a misconception with what social work consists of, there are misconceptions about every population that social workers interact with. For Juvenile convicts, this is no different. The belief about imprisoned youth is that they are violent and uncontrollable, just bad eggs. But I will be the first to tell you that this conclusion is far from the truth. Since the foundation of BuckeyeREACH there has been a total of zero fights during our programming. Not one or two but zero. Every time I enter the library at the Circleville Juvenile Correctional facility I am immediately welcomed by laughing and smiling inmates who could not be happier that they get to come to Dr. Patty’s program. Now this is not to say that these inmates are never violent. Most of them ended up imprisoned due to violence or at least having exposure to violence, but my point is that their identities are not violent. They are still kids. They enjoy playing games. They like making colorful rubber band bracelets. Violence does not define these youth, however they do find themselves trapped by it at times.

One of the principles that I have noticed at BuckeyeREACH is that people tend to behave in such a way that is expected of them. If we came into REACH expecting the kids to be violent, I am sure that we would see much more violence. However, Dr. Patty has done a phenomenal job in creating a program that treats the inmates according to who they are and not what they have done. The fact is that they are still youth, they like pizza and games. They like hanging out with their friends, and maybe most importantly, they like being valued and encouraged.

So what do I do? Well I am a social work student interning with Buckeye Civic Engagement Connections and spend my working hours hanging out with youth.