One wouldn't think of the Duke undergraduate population as closely related to the inhabitants of a prison's mental health division.
Perhaps that's a problem, a type of thinking that limits our ability to have empathy for the mentally ill. As former dean of students Karen Steinour puts it plainly, "In some ways there are some similarities" between the two groups.
Since leaving the University's student development office, Steinour had been working as a staff psychologist at the Mental Health Division of the Federal Correctional Institution at Butner, a medium-security facility, before recently being transferred to the low-security Correctional Institution at Butner.
It's the universality of human emotion and experience that has been most striking for Steinour. "Time and time again for me, I've been much more aware of similarities between me and the people I work with than differences," she says. "That's been real rewarding for me."
The job, which she says is "not unlike doing rounds in a psychiatric hospital" requires Steinour, who earned a doctorate in psychology, to do individual therapy and conduct group sessions for inmates with disorders ranging from depression to severe psychosis.
"From the outside looking in, one can look at an inmate in a certain way," she says. But when one interacts with that person on an individual level, as Steinour's job requires, one realizes how similar the inmate might be to others, a Duke student for example.
The primary difference Steinour points to is resource based--that is, growing up, the people with whom she now works had fewer resources and support than the people she came in contact with during her long stint as a Duke administrator. "In that way, my [role] at the prison has made me feel like I'm giving to some people who haven't had that type of support," she says. "I'm convinced more than ever that we need to pay a lot of attention to someone's early development."
Implicit in that early attention is a type of teaching. But Steinour is forced to deal with minds that are, for the most part, already "developed," thereby leaving the nurture and support of "early development" out of the equation. At Butner, as at Duke, the teacher in Steinour nevertheless remains a presence, though neither job is defined as such.
"My idea of teaching is not necessarily to impart knowledge," she says. Instead, she seeks to help people empower themselves and explore their personal options. In this respect, her sessions at Butner are similar to ones that characterized her University experience.
And while the transition was at first difficult--"[the] student development [office] felt like family"--it is these similarities that have made the job most rewarding. Says the psychologist: "I can say I'm really happy."
-- Russ Freyman
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