MONTAGNE: In the second of two reports on California's prisons, NPR's Richard Gonzales reports on how the new chief of adult prisons hopes to turn the system around

RICHARD GONZALES reporting:
It's late morning at San Quentin State Prison. An inmate leads more than a dozen fellow prisoners in a class about anger management.

Unidentified Man #1: Now put your right hand on your heart and your left hand on your stomach, and say 'I'm safe.'

Unidentified Men: (in unison) I'm safe.

Unidentified Man #1: 'I'm alive.'

Unidentified Men: (In unison) I'm alive.

Unidentified Man #1: 'Everything's OK.'

GONZALES: To the outside observer, the calm in the room belies every expectation about life behind bars.

HENRY(ph) (Inmate): My name's Henry. I've been in this program for about 18 months now. I'm doing six years for a violent crime. I'm familiar with anger.

GONZALES: This is just one of the programs at San Quentin where the focus is on rehabilitation instead of punishment. It's run with the help of community volunteers like Jacques Verdun (ph).

Mr. JACQUES VERDUN (Prison Volunteer): Henry is an example of somebody that doesn't took today the way he came in. He's taken every class we have in that place, so we have enormous buy-in from the inmates. They really want to turn their lives around.

GONZALES: The new director of California's adult prisons knows that kind of approach works. Jeanne Woodford made rehabilitation a priority when she was the warden of San Quentin and now she's counting on programs like these to help turn around a system known for its violence, corruption and mismanagement.

MS. JEANNE WOODFORD (Director, Califomia Department of Corrections): For a time period in the '80s and '90s even, there was a belief that there wasn't anything you� could do to change offenders. But since that time, there's now actually many studies that have been done that show that some programs do work.

Unidentified Man #2: The problem we're seeing nowadays is� there is no middle ground. You're either left or you're right.

Unidentifed Woman: Right, so we know -- and we, I think, talked a little bit about...

GONZALES: In the evening at San Quentin, every sea is filled in the American government class. This is California's only on-site prison college program. Jeff Brooks is serving a life sentence under the three-strikes law. He used to be skeptical about taking classes behind bars, but not anymore.

Mr. JEFF BROOKS (Inmate): You want to do something good for yourself. We don't want to just be sifting here idle, because I could go out to the yard and sit around and talk about the last crime somebody committed or how they did it or how they got away with something, but that's doing nothing for me internally. And, I mean, I've heard thousands of those kinds of stories. But if some guy starts telling me, 'Well, why do you use an adjective before a noun and what does it do?' and, you know, it makes a big difference.

GONZALES: The college classes at San Quentin exist solely because the support of volunteer teachers. Lifer Brian Smith says the atmosphere at San Quentin helped free him from the prison of his own mind.

Mr. BILLY BOOKER (Inmate): It's not these walls and these bars. It's what's inside my head. That's the only thing be keeping in prison, the old male role belief system, that image that I try to let it control my life is phony. It doesn't exist.

GONZALES: The outside world may have a hard time accepting the idea of giving a convicted criminal a free college education. But inmates will tell you that accepting rehabilitation is sometimes more difficult than punishment. Lifer Brian Smith says that's when many convicts are forced to face the facts.

Mr. BRIAN SMITH (Inmate): They have to admit that their current identity as a thug is not working. For someone to admit that they don't know how to read and write and usually those are the loudest people on the yard, talking the most -- they have to go school, and people are walking by and they know that classroom is where people learn how to read fourth-trade level, and right away, you're exposed to the fact that you're illiterate. Your identity is killed.

GONZALES: Rehabilitating a prisoner is one thing, but it's another matter to send inmates back to the communities where they have bleak job prospects. Jeanne Woodford says that point was recently driven home during a visit to the Watts neighborhood in Los� Angeles, where she met one community group.

Ms. WOODFORD: They said, 'Do you know, director, you send a hundred parolees a week to Watts?' I went, 'No, I didn't know that.' And they said, 'We have a 50 percent unemployment rate.' I said, 'Really?' 'So, director, what is it you think you can do inside your prison's going to make a difference here?'

GONZALES: Woodford thinks the answer may be creating a pilot program in Watts that will help newly released parolees connect with employers, churches and community organizations.

As for the inmates still behind bars, one recent survey found that Californians are ready to take a more compassionate approach with non-violent offenders, as long as it pays dividends. The poll was sponsored by the National Center for Crime and Delinquency. Barry Krisberg is the group's president.

Mr. BARRY KRISBERG (President National Center for Crime and Delinquency): We found across the board, in every question we asked, that the public is endorsing what I would call comprehensive rehabilitation approach. They want services to inmates while they're in prison and they want strong re-entry services.

GONZALES: But even with Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger's mandate to reform California's troubled prisons, changing the system won't be easy. Critics wonder whether anyone can do it, especially when the state is looking at an 8 billion budget deficit. With all eyes on her, Jeanne Woodford admits it will take time, but she says she's determined.

Ms. WOODFORD: On my given day in America, 1.5 million children have one or two parents in prisons. If that doesn't motivate you to do something about this issue, I don't know what will.

GONZALES: Richard Gonzales, NPR News.