The story below was featured in the National Association of Institutional Agribusiness 2025 Winter Newsletter:

There are more than 200 job positions for class 1B inmates throughout the Agriculture Division of the Arkansas Department of Corrections. Positions are highly sought after by many housed in Arkansas prisons since these jobs offer education and hands-on work experience that can be used upon release. Incarcerated Individuals get invaluable training while still serving their time, and they gain a sense of worth knowing they are bettering themselves.

There are a variety of jobs on ADC farms that incarcerated individuals do in conjunction with ADC staff. These individuals may be assigned to work in farm maintenance, poultry processing, horse barn, dairy processing, beef herd, gardening, or a variety of other locations within the division. Select incarcerated individuals have the opportunity to go to the Farrier School, located at the Cummins Unit, and use those skills to operate their own farrier business once released.

When asked, incarcerated individuals with a position on the farm take pride in the work they do every day. We spoke with a few inmates working at the Cummins Farm, and here is what they had to say:

Terrance “B” Bannister

“B” had been with the beef herd at the Cummins and Wrightsville farms since March 2022. He has also worked in vegetable processing at the Varner Unit and various other jobs at other units. We spoke to him as he was saddling up the horses to go out and check cattle:

“There’s different jobs out here so you don’t have to do the same job or profession, it all depends on what fits you. You can switch between jobs if you want to and if they need you. It’s a lot of trade work out here you can pick up that is valuable in the community. Just working with horses is worth a lot of money…it’s time consuming, but it’s worth a lot of money on the outside. Everyone is given the same opportunities if you fit the qualifications. We (inmates) are all here for a reason. So, we all have to stay positive and work towards your goals and keep God first.”

Thomas Corley

Corley has worked with or as field utility, building maintenance, farm maintenance, farm garage, rice squad, farrier, and scale house. We spoke with Corley as two 18-wheelers were coming through to be weighed at the scale house.

“I like my job because I’m not behind the fence all day. I’m out here in the fresh air and this is the most freedom I got. I’ve worked just about every place on this farm in the last 30 years.  I started in outside maintenance, then I went to farm garage, farm office, rice squad and now the scale house. I have a sense of value with this job. This right here (the scale house) is important to the farm. If you don’t like this job, you’ll screw up, and I like my job.”

Ricky “Doo Doo” Brown

“Doo Doo Brown” worked at the Wrightsville Farm in 1987-1988, at the Cummins Farm he worked with field security/fence crew in 1993-1994 and 2001-2011, vegetable processing at Benton Unit in 1995, and rice squad/farm maintenance since 2014 at the Cummins Farm. We spoke to him as he worked on a tractor at the farm garage.

“I did farm work most of my life, for 18 years out in the free world. I’ve been on the garage squad for about 13 and a half years and they asked me back again. It’s a good thing to get out of that building because there can be trouble in there. Also, it’s something that I like to do that I have done all my life. I get to operate high dollar equipment which means I got to take care of it or I’ll end up working on high dollar equipment (laughs). I mean it’s a good feeling to be out here working and helping the farm out where I can.”