I went to San Quentin State Prison today for my buddy @ChrisRedlitz's program The Last Mile, which teaches inmates coding, like building Wordpress sites, so they can get work when they're out. I learned a few things.
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1. Chris Redlitz is a bad motherf*cker. He's a badass VC but downplayed The Last Mile to me. He started the program 10 years ago. It's in 5 states, dozens of prisons. 100% of graduates secure employment upon release with a 0 percent recidivism rate. He's a guy u need to know
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2. We walked around the yard with the inmates. Chris is like a god there. They know how much he has helped the prison. If people screw up, they can't get into his program, and because of that the place is much safer.
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3. I hung out with a lot of inmates. Most of people were normal dudes who lost their temper or got into a sticky situation where they made bad choices. But...everyone in the program I spoke with was smart, nice, and someone I'd shoot the shit with anytime. I'd hire many of them
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4. Makes you realize those split-second decisions can really screw you up. Met a guy who was an engineer. He came home and caught his wife cheating. He assaulted both his wife and the guy. Got 14 years. Before that, no criminal record.
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5. I hung out with a few folks who knew Suge Knight, Tupac, and a bunch of Death Row folks. Heard stories about them, Tupac's murder, Death Row's founding.
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6. I saw San Quentin's news operation. These guys have a news tv program and paper newspaper that's read/seen by 30k inmates. A lot of dying newspapers need to study these guys...they're doing great stuff and their model can be implemented elsewhere.
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I'll add more stuff soon. But damn, it was a great experience that changed my view/stereotypes on these people. Also, made me realize how amazing Chris is!
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One last story: Zuckerberg was one of Chris's guests. After the guy got out, Zuck hired one of the inmates he met on his visit. https://thelastmile.org/product-manager-at-chan-zuckerberg-initiative/ …
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Another one of Chris's students is a fulltime engineer at Fandom: https://thelastmile.org/software-engineer-at-fandom/ …
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