Mentoring an Inmate

[augentier]

This has nothing to do with drugs but I thought I'd share because some of you may find it interesting..

I volunteered to participate in a program in which I'll be mentoring an inmate at a max. security prison. I'm paired up with inmate who I'll meet up with once a month for at least 6 months...we'll talk, bullshit, play cards, whatever. The idea behind the program is that prisoners are treated inhumanely (by being shut off from society) and when they're released they often dislike people and it becomes dangerous for everyone.

We weren't supposed to look up our inmate's information but uhh..my good friend tequila convinced me to, so I found out my guy is in there til 2018 for kidnapping, agg. robbery, and agg. battery w/ great bodily harm. He's 23 and has been in there for 3 years with only one visit to date.

Tonight is my first meet-up with him, I'm sooo excited/nervous. Since I'm a woman I paired up w/ a male in my sociology class who also happened to volunteer.

Have any of you ever done anything like this before? Any thoughts on this, like what type of questions would you ask if you were me?