 Hello, everyone. Welcome to the last keynote event of the day. So the United States has the highest incarceration rate in the world with over 2.2 million people behind bars in our prisons, jails, juvenile facilities, and detention centers. What do we do as software engineers to elaborate? We are joined by the amazing Jessica McKellan. So over to you. Thank you so much. Let me make sure I can get my screen sharing set up reasonably one second here. And then if I go ahead and which can I get some affirmation on what's what if any slides you see. Yeah, we see your place. Great. Okay. So welcome everyone. My name is Jessica McKellar and we're here today to talk about Python in prisons, how open source can change a criminal justice system. So the United States locks up more people per capita than any other country. I live in San Francisco in the state of California in the United States, and this is the country that I live in. I live in a country that still has the death penalty and routinely executes people at the federal level and in many states. I also live in a country where children serve life sentences without the possibility of parole. In other words, children are condemned to die in prison. My state California has the largest death row in the Western Hemisphere at San Quentin State Prison, which is just 45 minutes away from where I live in San Francisco. I live in a country where the criminal justice system is a direct successor to the control and labor economics of slavery. In some counties prisons are the single largest employer. Prisoners literally build and run the prisons that confine them, building construction and maintenance, meal preparation, laundry, janitorial services. Every California license plate is made by an incarcerated worker at Folsom State Prison. Incarcerated workers are paid 8 cents to 37 cents per hour for their work. By comparison, California's minimum wage is currently $12 per hour. One third of California's firefighters are incarcerated firefighters. California actually doesn't have enough firefighters to fight its fires right now because the prisons are on lockdown due to COVID-19. And so those incarcerated firefighters are not available and they've become part of the system. We rely on them. The system is extremely racist and it's also ineffective. Our prisons don't prevent crime. They actually increase it because incarceration produces a lifelong record and stigma that makes successful reentry with stable housing and employment extremely difficult. The system is ineffective and it's not even what survivors of crime want. This system persists not because it is a good one, but because it is an effective system of racial control and because it generates a lot of money. I talk about prison a lot because some of the most important people in my life are or used to be in prison. Friends, coworkers, I spend time every day with people who used to be in prison, people who were serving life sentences for serious violent crimes, but who despite the brutal circumstances of a prison system that is not sincerely interested in their rehabilitation, did the work to understand their own trauma and the harm they caused and became different people. I talk about prison because this brutal, ineffective, unjust system must be dismantled. And I talk about prison in forums like this one because it's a system that people like us, tech people, open source people, are actually disproportionately able to change. And that's what I'm here to talk about today. So as a quick reminder on who I am, my name is Jessica McKellar. I'm sort of a lifelong Python user and participant in the Python community. I helped build the Boston Python user group into the largest Python user group in the world. I was a director for the Python Software Foundation. I've been the diversity chair for Python North America for half a decade. My particular passions within the Python community are expanding access to programming and teaching new programmers. I also spend a lot of time in prison and supporting reentry for people getting out of prison. I actually teach a Python programming class in San Quentin State Prison in California. Every company that I've ever worked for has had a Python tech stack. I'm currently a founder in the CTO of a tech company in San Francisco called Pilot that of course uses Python and a bunch of Pilots employees are formerly incarcerated. One of the engineers at my company is named Simon. Simon was incarcerated as a child and grew up in the California prison system. He learned how to speak English in prison. Simon also learned how to program in prison through a nonprofit called The Last Mile, which is how I met him. The Last Mile was created to teach incarcerated people technology skills that align with modern labor markets so that when graduates get out of the prison, they can successfully get a job. Prior to The Last Mile, most of the work experience available in prisons was manual labor. You could learn how to cook in the prison kitchen. You could get certified as a janitor while working on the prison custodial staff. Perhaps you could learn something like carpentry through the prison industry authority. And these are all important jobs and skills, but in practice it can be difficult to secure a job in these areas of the labor market when you get out of prison. So The Last Mile took a new approach and decided to focus on one of the fastest growing labor markets in the United States and teach people how to program. The Last Mile's coding program was started in 2014 and is the first ever computer programming curriculum in the United States prison. In this program, students learn HTML, they learn JavaScript, they learn CSS, and of course they learn Python. There is no internet access in these programs. So everything is done through thumb drives and PDFs. And this was Simon's introduction to programming. After he got out of prison, he went through a coding boot camp called Hack Reactor and then interviewed for and accepted a full-time software engineering role with my company. But very few people have access to a program like The Last Mile. It's only running for a few dozen people in 11 prisons in the United States and we have a lot more than 11 prisons, unfortunately. And that's a problem because for most incarcerated people, becoming a programmer changes your life. It gives you access to the economics of being a programmer, the cash, the startup equity. More importantly, it connects you with other programmers. You become part of a group of people who have resources, who have power, and who are used to living in a world that we know we can change because we do it every day at work. Programmers fix stuff for a living. We are great at fixing broken systems. And I think it's worth dwelling on where that sense of empowerment and agency comes from. It is deeply ingrained in our open source culture in particular that we have the power to take things apart and change them and fix them and make them better and share those improvements with the world. That is an incredibly powerful mindset. And we mostly apply it to software systems. It's how Python exists. Guido saw a need for a new kind of language that was open source and intuitive and easy to learn and powerful, and he and many other people worked together to make it so. It's why we have this rich ecosystem of Python libraries and why we have this incredible international Python community. We have not just Python 2, but also Python 3. We believe that we can change things and make them better. So where I start getting really excited is when we take these tremendous capabilities, the collective resources and power and the confidence that we can change things and direct that not just towards software systems, but also to people systems. Because a programmer's mind is really an activist mind. We can't even help it. This is a video of Simon getting his ankle monitor removed. So for many months after he was released from prison, Simon was required to wear an ankle monitor at all times to track his location. While on parole after serving nearly two decades in prison, newly hired into his first software job, despite being under 24 hours surveillance by the state, Simon wasted no time leveraging his network, his new network of software engineers to help change a system that has brutalized him and so many other people. The first thing Simon did was bring more talented, formerly incarcerated people to pilot, changing the economic circumstances for several families. He led the creation of a mutual aid network, the Bay Area Freedom Collective, that has raised over $50,000 to provide reentry support, housing and employment to people getting out of prison. As a company inspired by Simon, we have organized around campaigns to change legislation in our state around incarceration. We have led campaigns to free vulnerable people from prison during the COVID-19 epidemics, and we have succeeded. We now run coding workshops to help last mile graduates prepare for software engineering interviews, and we're helping formerly incarcerated entrepreneurs start their own businesses. And this is just the beginning. And it's not just Simon. This is my friend Emile, who now works at Pilot 2 and is a prison abolitionist and community organizer. This is my friend Shaw, who now runs a media company centering the perspective of formerly incarcerated people in discussions of current events through videos and podcasts. There are so many talented people in our prisons. If they had the resources to change the world, they would. And we can help make that happen. So that brings us back to how we tech people can meaningfully change a criminal justice system. So inspired by Simon, as an exercise, let's talk concretely about what each of us can do to change a system like this. And the system in your country might look really different from mine. But I think it's still an interesting and useful exercise to practice thinking concretely about how we can engage with a big broken people system that must change. So when we get a large ambiguous engineering project, the first thing we do is a little planning and decomposition a breakdown of what problems we're trying to solve and approaches to solving them. So first things first, what is a non overwhelming way of thinking about criminal justice mass incarceration. What's a non overwhelming way of thinking about these topics and then some practical goals we could have together and as individuals within it. And here's a framing that I have found helpful for myself, breaking it down between opportunities for systemic impact and individual impact. And systemic impacts. My goal is decarceration changes to how we as a society think about crime and punishment that lead to legislative changes that lead to decarceration fewer people incarcerated for less time. For individual impact by the data two things that matter the most are housing and employment, a safe supportive stable place to live and a stable job that ensures that you'll have the money to take care of yourself and your family. And just should be great allies in the pursuit of these goals. We have the access to great jobs. Tech as a sector is perpetually hiring, which is not true everywhere else. We have skills that are useful. We are tech savvy, we have technical skills we can teach other people, we know how to make things go viral on the internet. We have money generally speaking. This is a financially privileged group. And so as technologists I'd frame up three categories of opportunities we have to affect systemic and individual impact as individuals as as any old human being who cares about this topic as technologists specifically and then also in partnership with our employers. So as individuals, there are a bunch of things that we can do. First and foremost, we can directly support people leaving prison, at least in California, at least in my country, many people who get out of prison, don't have any of the basic things that we used to get by in society today. You don't have a cell phone, you don't have a computer. Well, but it is literally true in California. It doesn't matter if you have been locked up for 40 years. The way that this works is when you get out you're given $200 and a ride to a bus stop. And that's the support that you get to make it on your own. So direct support for people leaving prison is a really, really important way that we can show up. Once people get out, bridging this huge gap left by the government, local reentry programs do the hard and important work of helping people with housing with job searches, staying sober, staying safe, and a lot of other things. And most of this work is done by volunteers. A lot of the work doesn't require a special background. This is work like helping people write resumes learn how to use a cell phone, learn how to use a computer. You know, we could all be one of these volunteers. And then finally, as individuals, we can't forget the reality that our criminal justice system is unfortunately a highly politicized system. And one of the ways to change it is through who we elect as our representatives and public officials. So it's really important that we vote, especially for positions that can impact the way that our prison systems are run. So that's the story as individuals. On top of what we can do as individuals, we have ways that we can uniquely contribute as technologists. And the first, which we've sort of already alluded to is the first is tech focused job training and reentry. Inside and outside of prisons. Inside of prisons in the United States, we can volunteer with programs like the last mile and maybe you have something similar in your country or maybe there's an opportunity to make something like this. Grow or come into existence, but you know, pre release job readiness skills, really, really important. And then outside of prisons, you know, a lot of reentry programming is about tech literacy, it's about how to use a cell phone, how to use the internet, how to write an email well. You know, how are you supposed to get a career building job, if you don't have a type, or if you don't know how to use a computer to complete an online application with confidence. So having enough support for these types of skill development is really, really important. And then I want to specifically call out another area of opportunity that is of exceptional relevance to this group of people, and that is programming boot camps. And this is really intersects with a lot of the work on diversity and inclusion that this community is already doing boot camps and more generally software engineering training for people who want to make a career transition are providing, are proving to be an important reentry opportunity for people coming out of prison. Regardless, potentially, of the of the prior career that you had prior to incarceration and the skills that you managed to develop in prison if you can get into a programming boot camp that can really change your life. So it's important that we're thoughtful about what opportunities folks have to engage with these types of programs. And finally, reentry and reform work is mostly done by small local nonprofits and these groups desperately need tech support, building and maintaining a website, migrating to modern cloud based collaboration tools, etc. They very much need our help. They, you know, we should help them so that they can spend all their time focusing on getting the actual message and the change out and not, you know, debugging whatever, you know, website configuration issue they're having. So this is another way we can really show up for these groups. Okay, and then finally, we have the last the third bucket and honestly the most important bucket and that is what can we do as employers. And I say that this is the most important thing because this is where the greatest economic impact lives. That's my belief at least. And that's a really simple thing it's just that we need to hire people with records. The number one thing that we can do is we need to hire people with records. We can highlight a couple of specific table stakes issues on this topic. And, you know, the details of this may change from country to country but I suspect that a lot of this is relatively universally true. The first thing we need to do is examine how our companies use background checks. Do our companies conduct background checks. And if they do, what do they do with the results. Do we automatically disqualify people who have felony convictions. If we don't have the answers to these questions we should find out and organize to make sure that our companies aren't blanket disqualifying talented candidates because of harmful stereotypes. The second thing that's really important is that people coming out of prison may have an educational and career background different from the candidate pools we typically focus on. If we are blanket disqualifying people based on having a particular type of degree attending a specific college experience with specific prior employers. We are throwing out resumes from qualified candidates including candidates coming out of prison. We need to take a hard look at what the true requirements are for entry level roles. Does every entry level person on a customer support team or a sales team or your office management team actually need, you know, a 4.0 grade point average from a top tier university plus a Facebook internship. You know, probably not. You know, they need to be reliable, sharp problem solvers with good communication skills and we in turn need to have good training and mentorship programs to support entry level employees in their on the job skill development. So we need to take a real critical look at if our entry level roles are truly entry level and if they're really serving to build a diverse and inclusive workplace. And finally, if we want to hire people with records, we need to spend time with people with records who are looking for jobs. And this is the point that ties together all of the other activities we talked about making a difference usually requires building relationships. In the United States what I recommend doing is volunteering with job training and reentry programs inside or outside of prisons that's an easy way to meet and build relationships with people who have the skills and attitude for the roles you're working for. If you do an internet search for reentry programs in your city or in a nearby prison, you will find everything from academic classes to interview practice to resume building workshops to tech literacy training. All of these programs are trying to get people out and into good jobs, and all of these programs need volunteers like us. And when you start hiring people with records, you start hiring people like Simon. You start fighting the system personally, and you become intolerant of the injustice and you start organizing, and you start acting, and before you know it you can't help but change the world. Now, maybe prisons aren't your thing, and that's fine, but we've all got something in our country in our community, a big people system that is unjust and must change. And I hope this talk was a reminder that we have the power and we have the resources to change it. And more about prisons in the United States. I recommend listening to currently informally incarcerated community members. Here are some of the people leading the conversation on prisons in the US. There are some really talented community organizers on Twitter. And then I've linked to the Patreon pages for Shaw, who I had referenced earlier in this talk, and then also for the Bay Area Freedom Collective, Simon's organization, and I would love if you would check those out. That is Python in prison, how open source can change a criminal justice system. Thank you for listening. And I look forward to hearing about what big people system you are tackling in the year ahead. Thank you so much. All right, that was a very powerful talk. So, so do you want to answer some questions now. Yeah, absolutely. Let's do it. All right, so here's the first one. Are there any considerations regarding the box. Many companies include it on their application regarding felony convictions is a reassuring note. That's sent along with the telephone. I'm sure I understood that. Can you. Sorry, can you repeat the question. Are there any considerations regarding the box that many companies include on their application regarding felony convictions is a reassuring note along with the telephone. Perfect. Yes. So, at least in the United States and again I'm this is I'm sure various country to country in the United States. Depending on what state you're in employers or potential employers can ask you about your criminal history and can use that information to discriminate against you before they've really interviewed you. And in some states that's actually been made illegal because it has such consequences for people who have records but have served their time and, you know, have our back out in society and still need to be able to get a job and pay the bills and take care of themselves like anybody else. So some states like New York, for example, have passed legislation to ban the box where you can't ask about if people have a felony conviction, prior to making them an offer. That's really important. You know that it's a small piece of the bigger story but it's important that we are giving talented candidates a real shot during job interviews without prejudging them based on something from their past. That's really important. More states should adopt that legislation. In general, there are significant barriers to employment. It's not just that but the broader topic of how to. I mean if you don't want people to go back to prison they need to be able to get a good job right so like what if we had to envision from the ground up what kind of system would facilitate that, and that's a win when that's about reducing crime rates and improving, you know, sort of building successful communities. If we could start from the ground up and invent a system that really ensured that everybody was able to get a good job that could pay the bills. What would that system look like because it definitely wouldn't look like our current system. I see a question in the Q&A box should I. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So here's the next question. Have there been studies done comparing the recidivism rates among those that have been through programs such as the last mile and those who are without such programs. If so, do people and politicians listen to that data. Yeah, it's a great question and there's a bunch to unpack in this. So first recidivism rates are, that's a, you know, a specific quantification of people who get out of prison and then return to prison for some reason. And there's a lot that there's a whole separate conversation about how to do that in a way that is useful because what timeline we're talking about matters, what was the nature of the activity that caused a return to prison? Was it similar or different from the original offense? There's a bunch of stuff that we could break down on recidivism, but the long and short of it is that in the United States recidivism rates are very high. In general, it like, you know, for the total sort of prison population, a lot of people return to prison. And that's not because they're bad people or because they, there's something sort of inherently criminal about them. It's because the system is set up to cause people to return to prison. In particular, the most common reason why somebody who is in prison might get out and return to prison is because the underlying issue that drove their original criminal behavior was a drug problem. So a prison is not a good place to address addiction. It's a terrible place to address addiction. And so it's no wonder that if you were an addict going into a prison that in many cases it's very difficult to get the support you need for that to really materially change by the time you get out. So we could imagine a totally different way of handling addiction in our country that does not involve shoving people into a prison system that's not going to take good care of them, right? So that's like one example of a sort of obvious reason why recidivism rates for one particular population are high. It's because the way that we handle this is stupid. The question was originally about, you know, do folks who go through the last mile, do they have better outcomes? And the answer is definitely yes, because it's all about being able to get a job. Like if you can get a good job after you get out, you're not going to, you're not going to, like there's no, the underlying circumstances that might cause like a need to try to take care of yourself in some way that could cause you to end up back in prison. So if you can go away, if you can take, if you have a good job. So folks who are, and it's not just the last mile, but if you, you know, if you have like job skills that you can actually get hired for, if you were able to get a college degree while you're in prison, all of these things are like highly correlated with successful outcomes. So yes, so educational and employment opportunities are a big, big piece of reducing recidivism. But the other thing that's important to highlight though is that a lot of folks, if we just did a reasonable job of taking care of people, you got to remember this is the United States, like we don't have universal health care. We don't, we have, we have like a very weak social safety now. So this is true of anybody, not just people coming out of prison. Like if you fall on hard times, if you can't get a job, you're in a really tough spot. And so if we, you know, this is part of why I care so much about talking about prisons is it's a lens for talking about broader social change. It's a problem that people don't aren't guaranteed shelter and food and health care in this country. And one way that we see this manifest is in poor outcomes for people coming out of prison. But so yes, the last mile helps education helps. It's also the case that though criminality is something that is basically a thing that young people do people age out of criminality. Like the fact that we have people, you know, spending their entire lives or many decades in prison in the United States is is purely the result of sentencing policies that were set not by criminology experts they were set by politicians looking to be tough on crime so that they would get elected. Like the whole system. The system was not designed to be effective. This is not an optimized system. It's one that is simply excessively punitive and is not effective. So there's a whole I mean we could we could talk about prison for for days, but to answer this specific question. Yes, people who go through the last mile, they get out they get good jobs they don't come back to prison and a bunch of them are my friends they're great human beings. Okay, another question. Do I work in women's prisons as well. I do. So actually the last mile is in several women's prisons. I'm actually fun story. A wonderful talented woman named Linda, who went through the last mile. Is I have gone through some interview prep with her. And she's actually going to start interviewing for software engineering jobs in the Bay Area starting next week she's like ready to go she's I'm confident that she's going to pass these interviews is super sharp. She's a great. She's a great programmer. She's a great example of someone who you know she she was in a different career prior to incarceration. She is. I think she's in her 40s now. So this is in many ways like a classic example of someone who is making a career pivot to software, you know after doing something for the earlier parts of her life. And she's going to be great. She's going to be great. I just got yeah I just got worried about some interview prep for her and I'm really excited about that. So yes the last mile is in is in some women's prisons again is a very small program though the vast majority of people 2.3 million people in California and sorry in the United States are incarcerated. You know the couple of dozens of people who get to benefit from the last mile are very fortunate individuals, but to me that's a testament to success and it works. So how do we expand it how do we get more people access to more opportunities like this that set them up for real success when they get out. Great.