Young Inmates Find a Voice Through Short Films

Tina Fineberg for The New York Times

Amirah Harris, a former inmate on Rikers Island, had her work shown last week at the Tribeca Performing Arts Center.

An expectant hush fell over more than 300 young adults packed into a theater at the Tribeca Performing Arts Center as a screening of short films was about to start. Amirah Harris was palpably excited — this would be not only her first time seeing her work on the big screen, but also her first time seeing it outside of jail.

As her 90-second short began last week, Ms. Harris started mouthing the words to the score she had chosen, "Complicated," by Nivea. Then the script began unfolding, with Ms. Harris nodding her head as the audience digested her words.

She beamed when the audience applauded at the end of her film, which she made while incarcerated on Rikers Island.

"I was blunt, I was being me," she said moments later. "I felt loved."

Ms. Harris, 20, is a graduate of Tribeca Teaches, a program that instructs young people in 21 schools in New York City and Los Angeles on how to make movies. She was part of the inaugural class of about 40 female inmates at East River Academy, an alternative high school at Rikers.

Administrators do not consider such instruction indulgent or frivolous. They hope that mastering a difficult computer program and creating a work of art will raise inmates' self-esteem and confidence, familiarize them with computers and prepare them for their eventual release.

Dora B. Schriro, commissioner of the New York City Department of Correction, called Tribeca Teaches "spot on" and an invaluable addition to the Rikers curriculum.

"We were focusing in particular on creating a robust after-school program, first to reduce idleness because that keeps the kids safer," Ms. Schriro said, "but not just to fill the time but to provide opportunities that might enrich their lives and help them find something to pursue."

In November, Flonia Telegrafi, a teaching artist from the Tribeca Film Institute, which facilitates the program, began joining classes at East River Academy twice a week. She said she showed the Peter Sollett short film "Five Feet High and Rising" to the inmates and had each create video responses titled "Letters to Donna," among other activities.

"I got a great response from the students because they've seen it in their communities, or in their lives," Ms. Telegrafi said. "They were earnest in a way I hadn't really experienced."

Two of the video letters, including Ms. Harris's, were shown at the screening last Tuesday, which featured short films by Tribeca Teaches' students from all the schools.

"The students are ecstatic" about their work being shown to peers outside of jail, Ms. Schriro said. "The whole school is quite jazzed about this."

Of course, teaching at Rikers involves challenges unlike those in even the most troubled public schools. Video cameras are forbidden, so footage for the films either had to be archival or shot off the island, by volunteers from the Maysles Institute. All media had to be approved by the Department of Correction before it was allowed into the classroom. The roster of students changed regularly, as inmates were released or transferred to other institutions and 50-minute class periods were occasionally truncated by alarms (Ms. Telegrafi emphasized that she had never been concerned about her safety while teaching there).

Ms. Telegrafi said the most important attribute for a teacher at Rikers was patience, both with the time-consuming procedures of a disciplinary institution and with students of different ages, skill and comfort levels. She said the program served several purposes like giving the young women a sense of control over their futures, and that perhaps the films created would help the outside world face its prejudices against former inmates.

"It ultimately brings up their confidence and validates their experience," Ms. Telegrafi said. "It's important to show that just because they're inside Rikers doesn't mean they don't have a voice."

Ms. Harris was sent to Rikers last summer and released in February. She is taking classes toward the General Education Development test, known as the G.E.D., and lives in Brownsville with her mother and one-year-old son, Divine. She would not discuss why she went to jail.

After the show, Ms. Harris said she thought Tribeca Teaches was a wonderful experience and hoped it continued at Rikers.

"Being in there, it's like you don't really get to do things and you're bounded to certain activities," she said.

Moments before the screening Ms. Harris met the actress Taraji P. Henson. She posed for photos on the red carpet with Ms. Henson, then gushed "That's so going on Facebook." She immediately began tapping away on her smartphone, star-struck, then walked in to take her seat in the theater.

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