When Jan Warren graduated from high school in 1969, she wanted to become a doctor. Instead, her dreams were derailed when she was sentenced to prison at age 35 for selling drugs. Last night at the Graduate School of Education (GSE), Warren shared her story as part of a kickoff event for "Prisons in America," a conference sponsored by the Harvard Prisoner Education Program.

"If I had known where to go, I wouldn't have sold drugs," she said. "And if it can happen to me, it can certainly happen to other people."

Warren, who served a 12-year sentence at Bedford Hills Correctional Facility in New York, called for prison reform, saying that educating inmates is the key to improving society.

"If prisons were working, we wouldn't be building more of them," she said.

A pamphlet passed out at the beginning of the event said that California has built 21 prisons and only one new university since 1984. The pamphlet also cited statistics showing that half of the American population will be in incarcerated by the year 2053 if the prison population continues to grow at the current rate.

The event featured two documentaries highlighting the benefits of education programs for inmates and emphasizing that these programs are dying as a result of decreased federal funding.

"[At Bedford Hills] it costs the same to incarcerate a woman for a year as to send her to Harvard for a year," filmmaker Benay Rubenstein said.

Rubenstein's documentary "The Last Generation" said that prisoners often did not get fair opportunities for education when they were young. Prison, she said, should be a place where people can get a second chance.