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University of North Texas students are participating in the national Inside Out Prison Exchange program.

In its third year at the college, the program gives students the opportunity to take a class inside a correctional facility alongside incarcerated people.

Haley Zettler, associate professor of criminal justice at the university, said students must be a junior or senior and go through an interview to participate.

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"One of the things that I make sure that they know during the interview process is that we're not going in to try to study or psychoanalyze people who are incarcerated and ask them about their life history," Zettler explained. "We're going in there for them to take the class alongside them."

She noted for students to participate, their majors must be related to working with people in prison such as criminal justice, psychology or political science.

The Inside Out Prison Exchange Program was started at Temple University and is replicated at more than 100 colleges and correctional facilities worldwide. Zettler pointed out it gives the incarcerated person a chance to see a different future for themselves.

"They put in a lot more effort on average than my outside students, in their assignments and reading and participation," Zettler observed. "So a number of them have expressed, 'Now I'm thinking about what I can do on the outside in terms of furthering my education.'"

For incarcerated people to participate, they must have a high school diploma or GED. Zettler added the course teaches them other skills, which will be beneficial once they are released.

"They may have spent many years and the only interactions they've had are with correctional officers," Zettler emphasized. "So to have just what they call normal people from the outside coming in once a week and speaking to them on a human level have helped them with just their overall communications skills, their confidence."