CAS CONNECT 2014

23 Moments such as the latter drew tremendous laughter, no doubt a welcome release in between teardrop-inducing pieces with titles like “How to Trust” and “Forgiveness and More.” According to Jinks, the inmates embraced the young actors’ interpretations. “They were very impressed with the skills of the acting students. Some of them said, ‘Well, that’s what I was trying to do with my part!’ ” After the students performed, they held a question-and-answer session with the inmates. Dorsey and Graham both noted how much the prisoners enjoyed seeing trained actors deliver the script. Suddenly confronted with seeing both sets of very different students in the same space (“I felt like my parents were meeting my future in-laws”), Jinks spent most of the time watching the inmates. “I saw some people crying as they saw their pieces read back to them,” she says. “I remember looking at Kevin, who’s 6-foot- 7, and seeing his mouth wide and his eyes wide, watching this student read his part. He was glowing.” That performance ended a sixth-month journey for Jinks and the inmates. She received four letters shortly after the event, all complimentary and the inmates asked for addi- tional writing assignments. She will return in the fall to continue working at the Lilley Correctional Center and has already expanded the ArtsAloud- OSU program, with Delaino taking the lead at Jess Dunn Correctional Center in Taft, Okla. Jinks hopes to add another prison and more volunteers soon. Gratitude became the fruit of her first mission with ArtsAloud- OSU. From the inmates reflecting on their time to their own perfor- mance, to then watching trained OSU actors tell the story they had written, to the actors feeling privileged to perform in front of, and meet, the authors, every turn produced reciprocal gratitude. On April 18, 2014, at the John H. Lilley Correctional Center, a group of OSU students went to prison. They could not have been more thankful. Brian Petrotta