The Business of Second Chances

University of Virginia Darden School of Business Professor Greg Fairchild (MBA ’92) and his wife, Tierney Temple Fairchild (MBA ’93), have grown their effort to reduce recidivism among Virginia’s prison inmates by teaching them business and entrepreneurship skills into a thriving nonprofit that recruits Darden and other UVA students to serve as case study leaders for classes of inmates each year.

UVA’s Office of Advancement Communications recently profiled the Fairchilds growing effort in a feature titled, “The Business of Second Chances.”

The classes are offered in two Virginia corrections facilities, Dillwyn Correctional Center and Fluvanna Correctional Center for Women; along with one federal facility, the Petersburg Federal Correctional Institution (in which Darden alums lead the classroom teaching). The participants have the opportunity to earn a certificate of completion in Darden’s special entrepreneurship, financial capability, and foundations of business courses.

The class meets two nights a week for nine months. A graduation ceremony is held, replete with “pomp and circumstance,” said Fairchild. There’s even a cake.

Fairchild is grateful for the funding he received from UVA’s Jefferson Trust, the Tayloe Murphy Center, and the Bankard Fund.

Other schools have reached out to Fairchild, expressing interest in implementing his program. This past spring, the Fairchilds launched a collaborative program with Columbia University at the Taconic Correctional Facility in Westchester County, New York. UVA and Darden alums will teach along Columbia MBAs. Fairchild would like to see more departments at UVA bring their resources to the inmates.

“UVA is out in front of this kind of program,” he said. “There are a host of other subjects that could be taught in prison.”

Read the full story at giving.virginia.edu.