Inside Mount Tamalpais College at San Quentin
30 Years of Higher Education for Incarcerated People
Date: Thursday, March 12, 2026
Time: Program 1:30 – 3:00pm (Please check-in 1:00-1:30pm)
Where: Marin Rod & Gun Club, 2675 Francisco Blvd East, San Rafael, CA 94901
(click here for more information and directions)
Cost: $12 for one or $18 for two ($15/person at the door)
Refreshments: No-host food and beverages are available at the MRGC bar (cash or credit card)
Speaker:
Jody Lewen, President of Mount Tamalpais College
[Click here to scroll to Program and Speaker Descriptions below]
Reservations:
Program Description
This year, Mount Tamalpais College (MTC) celebrates 30 years of higher education for people incarcerated at San Quentin. Join MTC President Jody Lewen and an MTC alumnus for a lively conversation about the impact of high-quality education in prison and the College’s history, current programs, and vision for the future.
Mount Tamalpais College’s mission is to provide an intellectually rigorous, inclusive Associate of Arts degree program and College Preparatory Program, free of charge, to people at San Quentin Rehabilitation Center; to expand access to quality higher education for incarcerated people; and to foster the values of equity, civic engagement, independence of thought, and freedom of expression.
Speaker:
Jody Lewen is president of Mount Tamalpais College, at San Quentin State Prison in Marin County, California. MTC provides a liberal arts Associate of Arts degree, as well as an intensive college preparatory program, to approximately 300 people incarcerated at San Quentin. MTC also provides support to higher education in prison practitioners and other stakeholders, including correctional administrators, funders, policymakers, and media, on creating academically excellent, inclusive in-prison higher education programs.
Dr. Lewen holds a Bachelor’s degree from Wesleyan University (modern European history); a Master’s degree from the Freie Universität, Berlin (comparative literature and philosophy); and a PhD from the University of California, Berkeley. She was the recipient of the Peter E. Haas Public Service Award from the University of California, Berkeley in 2006.
In 2016, MTC (then the Prison University Project) received the National Humanities Medal from President Barack Obama. In 2018, Dr. Lewen was named a Frederick Douglass 200 awardee. In 2023, California governor Gavin Newsom invited Dr. Lewen to join the San Quentin Transformation Advisory Council. In 2024, she was awarded the McGraw Prize in Education, in recognition of her contributions to the field of higher education.