Ask students to watch “The New Asylum” Frontine video on the PBS website (http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/asylums/view/). Note. This link takes you directly to the PBS website, which and you will leave the university site. Facilitate a class discussion by asking students some or all of the following questions about the movie.
· 1. What percentage of the U.S. jail and prison population is diagnosed with mental illness?
· 2. Why do you think many individuals with mental illness end up behind bars? What are the major causes? What is some possible prevention?
· 3. What percentage of the female prison population is diagnosed with mental illness?
· 4. What is the racial breakdown of mental illness in prison?
· 5. Do the inmates with mental illness serve longer or shorter sentences than the general inmate population?
· 6. Do individuals with mental illness have higher recidivism rates than the general inmate population?
· 7. What’s being done to address recidivism?
· 8. How difficult is it to provide mental health care inside a prison?
· 9. What is segregation and how does it affect those with mental illness?
· 10. What are communities doing to tackle this problem?
· 11. At the national level, are there any efforts underway to help people with mental illness who are in prisons and jails?
· 12. What can citizens do to improve the treatment of those with mental illness, especially those in prisons and jails?
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