St. Margaret's parishioner provides job training to the incarcerated

SYRACUSE, N. Y. (The Catholic SUN) - "It was divine intervention," said Bob Mattucci, parishioner at St. Margaret's Church in Mattydale. Mattucci explained how, after working as a plumber for 22 years, he became a vocational education teacher and continued on to develop a basic plumbing training program for prison inmates.

Mattucci teaches the training program at Monroe County Penitentiary in Rochester, N.Y. and Suffolk County Correctional in Long Island, N.Y. The program has enabled him to combine his two passions -- plumbing and teaching. Mattucci's father, 85-year old Benny Mattucci, realizes what a challenge his son faces and is inspired by the work that he does. "He tells me how many of his students have graduated from the program and I am so proud of him," said Benny. "I have the greatest admiration for his talent and what he is doing." Twenty-five years ago, Mattucci completed his bachelor's degree in elementary education, but decided to enter the commercial, residential and industrial plumbing field to work as a plumber. At 47 years old, Mattucci decided to enroll at Syracuse University to earn a master's degree in elementary education and teach in that field. Mattucci's guidance counselor, however, felt he would be too old by the time he graduated to enter the field of elementary education. As an alternative, his counselor encouraged him to enroll in the vocational education master's program at SUNY Oswego. Mattucci began working on his master's program in 1998 and the plumbing training program evolved from it. As part of the needs assessment fulfillment for his master's, Mattucci traveled throughout Onondaga County in order to survey the training facilities for plumbers. He found that there were no plumbing programs or vocational education programs outside the union in any vocational school or the regional education unit. He found that the last apprenticeship plumbing training program was run by the Association of Building Contractors (ABC) and had closed its doors approximately 10 years earlier. Today, Local 267 -- the plumber's union -- runs the only accredited plumbing program in Onondaga County. However, plumbers' unions all over the country, frustrated by the retirement of the baby boomer generation and the difficulty of recruiting minorities to the profession, are struggling to fill the demand for qualified entry-level plumbers. In response to the lack of training opportunities, Mattucci wrote a plumbing maintenance program based on his plumbing experience. The 42-lesson program was copyrighted in 2000. His goal was to train plumbers and to introduce his plan to the schools. Mattucci said he got into the corrections field by accident. After being marketed, his program was rejected by all of the public school vocational education programs in the Syracuse region. But Mattucci was determined to find a way to put his training program into practice. After researching education in correctional facilities, Mattucci learned that there was a void in education programs in the corrections system and that educating the inmates could reverse the likelihood of re-incarceration. Mattucci contemplated what a plumbing curriculum could potentially offer to the incarcerated individuals. His training program was designed to foster success and focus on motivation, decision-making, respectful environment and teamwork as a foundation for change. He saw his program as an experience that might motivate those in prison to contribute to society in a positive way. Tim Gangemi, a fellow parishioner at St. Margaret's, thinks Mattucci's training program is a wonderful idea. "I also think some of the other skilled trades like carpentry and masonry should be taught to the inmates," he said. Taking into consideration the many barriers associated with working within the prison system, Mattucci developed a plan for three phases of inmate education that would build the students' commitment and responsibility over time while rewarding them with immediate successes in the classroom. Phase I consisted of an eight-session program while in prison; phase II included a 42-session program for after they were released and phase III included admission to a plumber's union as second-year apprentices. Convinced of the value of his training program, Mattucci persisted, presenting his program to the education coordinator at the Onondaga County Department of Correction facility in Jamesville, N.Y. in 2000. Mattucci taught the training program in the evening at the Jamesville facility from 2000 to 2002. After Mattucci taught his second program, he thought it might be a good idea to teach the program to women inmates. He did and he was successful -- seven out of the eight students in the class graduated. "Women do learn differently than men," said Mattucci. "This is an individualized learning program. Everyone learns at a different rate of speed. Women perceive things differently. You have to give them more hands-on experience as far as working with the tools because they haven't had a lot of experience working with them. Their analytical and teamwork skills amazed me. Teaching them was rewarding because afterwards, the women, many of whom were single mothers, came up to me and told me how grateful they were that I gave them the power to fix their own plumbing. That's why I wrote the textbook." Mattucci began to write a textbook for the program in 2002 because he felt the one he was using was inadequate. He wanted the book to include the three basic plumbing themes of toilets, kitchen sinks and plugged drains. The skills could be used in everyday life in addition to serving as the requirements that a plumbing contractor would be seeking in a prospective employee. Throughout the years, Mattucci changed and improved the curriculum of the program. Teaching at additional facilities in Rochester and Long Island, Mattucci again felt there was something missing. While attending school to become certified to be an OSHA (Occupational Safety and Health Administration) instructor, Mattucci realized the inmates lacked basic math skills. So, he developed a math textbook to be used in the training course. The program has also been changed from a 37-hour program to a 16-hour one. The program also counts as 3.7 college credit hours at Monroe Community College in Rochester, where Mattucci serves as an adjunct professor of vocational education. Mattucci said that a study was done recently indicating that 70 percent of his students have not returned to prison. The success rate was even higher with his female students. Mattucci is committed to seeing that the program continues. Because he wants the program to be available in prisons nationwide, three years ago he sent proposals to correctional facilities throughout the country. Looking back, Mattucci said, "It was a long, hard road, but it was also fun. If I didn't have faith in God, none of this would be happening. My faith is the foundation for everything that I do. This is blind faith."

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This story was made available to Catholic Online by permission of The Catholic SUN (www.syrdio.org), official newspaper of the Diocese of Syracuse, N.Y.