Justice Radio ~ WMPG
Justice Radio is a talk show that tackles hard questions about our criminal legal system in Maine. How do we envision justice? Does our current criminal legal system provide justice? Do prisons and jails keep us safe? What should accountability and repair look like in the wake of harm? How do people released into communities cope with the overwhelming adjustment to technology changes, finding housing and work, and building relationships? Our rotating hosts will offer an ongoing 4-week cycle of shows that address these and other questions through moderated conversations with leaders in the field of the criminal legal system, abolitionist organizers, justice-impacted people, and other experts and community members.
Mackenzie and Linda’s show, “Creating Windows, Not Bars,” talks about the challenges of reentry and airs on the third Sunday of every month at 11:30 am on WMPG 90.9.
Mackenzie Kelley and Linda Small of Reentry Sisters were interviewed by Catherine Besteman on Are Prisons the Answer? on Justice Radio
Visit: Justice Radio Archived episodes Listen on WMPG, WERU, and WMHB
Columbia University Center for Justice and Center for Effective Public Policy
Reentry Sisters partnered with the Center for Effective Public Policy to discuss Integrating Gender Justice Strategies Within and Beyond the Walls Center for Justice at Columbia University's Beyond the Bars Conference in NYC! Our session explored and analyzed tensions within collective movements to advance change within and outside of carceral spaces.
New England Commission on the Future of Higher Education in Prison
Brought together by the Educational Justice Institute at MIT, the New England Commission on the Future of Higher Education in Prison is a collaboration of critical stakeholders who work to increase the availability of affordable, high-quality postsecondary prison education programs in each of the six New England states. We identify specific ways in which stakeholders can collaborate within and across the states to accelerate progress, build capacity, economize resources, avoid duplication, and improve quality and outcomes. You can access the commission’s report by clicking here.
Freedom & Captivity event at the Speedwell Gallery
Women from the Southern Maine Women’s Reentry Center performed at the Speedwell Gallery in Portland, Maine. The “Changing the Narrative” show was part of the Freedom & Captivity project. The ensemble danced, sang, read poetry, and shared stories.
Freedom & Captivity (F&C) curricula
The Freedom & Captivity Curriculum Project created curricula based on the materials generated through the Fall 2021 collaborative, statewide public humanities Freedom & Captivity initiative which explores how to imagine an abolitionist future in Maine. The initiative included exhibitions, podcasts, film and photography projects, performances, presentations, workshops, and didactic materials, and was created with the participation of incarcerated and formerly incarcerated people. The curricula, structured around key humanities themes, are for college courses, discussion groups, and community classes taught by incarcerated people. Please sign up if you, your organization, or your group would like to take a free class.
Freedom & Captivity 2024 ACLS Digital Justice Development Grantee
Congratulations to the F&C family who were just awarded a 2024 ACLS Digital Justice Grant for the Freedom & Captivity
Freedom & Captivity will build a digital archive of carceral experience - the hidden stories of Maine’s incarcerated community members - and perform that archive at venues across the state. The curated archive will be housed at the Maine Memory Network, Maine Historical Society’s digital history platform, and all the material collected for the project will be archived in Colby College Library’s Digital Collections. This will be the first archival space in Maine to hold stories about incarceration, curated and sensitively contextualized by those most impacted by carcerality. By offering a platform for the voices of those previously silenced by carcerality, our project aims to shift the narrative around justice, accountability, and the need for incarceration in the wake of harm.
Abolition Night
Held annually at the The Strand Theatre in Rockland, Maine as part of the Freedom & Captivity project, justice-impacted people perform to a sold-out audience. This event is hosted in partnership with the Opportunity Scholars, Maine Prisoner Advocacy Coalition, the University of Maine Augusta Prison Education Partnership, and Freedom & Captivity. Check out 2022's event and 2023's event!
The National Council of Currently and Formerly Incarcerated Women & Girls
Our Sisters at the National Council hosted a March in 2024 in Washington, DC. Please watch this video of the march and sisters in action.
National Prison Debate League
Debates with the Maine Department of Corrections
Starting in 2022, the NPDL has hosted debates between schools such as MIT, Boston College, Wake Forest and Harvard University, and debate teams composed of residents at Maine-based facilities. Maine Public Radio covered the MIT versus Maine DOC debate.
Right/Write to Heal Initiative
The Right/Write to Heal: Incarcerated and Formerly Incarcerated Women in Their Own Voices is an initiative with the Center for Justice at Columbia University’s School of Social Work and VDay. We believe the time is overdue for women to tell their own stories, in their own voices, about how they came to be incarcerated, what prison has done to their lives, and what they face on the inside and after being released. Our mission with Right/Write to Heal: Incarcerated and Formerly Incarcerated Women in Their Own Voices is to impact the current narrative by empowering women to write and directly share their own stories through mainstream and social media, podcasts, and a published anthology, all archived for historical purposes; and the ultimate goal is to humanize the unique individual and collective experiences of women, particularly women of color, who from early in their lives face racism, violence, and structural barriers that lead to punishment and imprisonment. Maine and New York Sisters meet weekly for the Right/Write to Heal weekly writing group.
Behind the Door
Check out the Behind the Door podcast with Brandon Brown and Jeremy Hiltz - Behind the Door Podcast Inaugural episode) Taking the door off the American prison system. Your hosts Brandon and Jeremy reveal insights about what it's like to be incarcerated, reenter society, and how the system impacts families, communities, and taxpayers.
Brave Behind Bars
Brave Behind Bars is a prison education initiative promoting and teaching coding, website design, and computing knowledge for women. Mackenzie Kelley and Linda Small took this class offered through The Educational Justice Institute at MIT.
We are thrilled to use our skills learned in the Brave course for Reentry Sisters. Thank you to the team and coaches of the Brave Behind Bars course.
Here we are at The Educational Justice Institute for the New England Commission for the Future of Higher Education. Read the report here.
Institutions of Higher Education
Incarcerated women and men in Maine have educational opportunities in higher education. The following are some of the institutions that have established connections with the Maine Department of Corrections and provide classes and/or degree programs for residents.
Colby College
Colby College Justice Think Tank
MIT
Washington County Community College (ME)
University of Maine at Augusta
Crisis Intervention Resources
The following are service providers for times of crisis.
● Warmline Sweetser 866-771-9276
o It is a mental health peer-to-peer phone support line for adults, aged 18 and older, offering mutual conversations with a trained peer specialist who has life experience with mental health recovery.
● Maine Crisis Line: 1-888-568-1112.
o The Maine Crisis Line (MCL) is the single point of entry to Maine's Behavioral Health Crisis Services System
● Text HOME to 741741 from anywhere in the United States, anytime. Crisis Text Line is here for any crisis. A live, trained Crisis Counselor receives the text and responds, all from our secure online platform. The volunteer Crisis Counselor will help you move from a hot moment to a cool moment.
● When you text GOOD2TALKNS to 686868, you'll be connected to a trained, volunteer crisis responder to talk about any issue on your mind.
Telehealth Platforms
Better Life Partners- Statewide Intake: 1-866-679-0831 Same or next day appointments typically available
Groups Recover Together- Statewide Intake: 1-800-683-8313 Same or next day appointments typically available
Publications
Linda Small. Contributor to Supervision: On Motherhood and Surveillance, Edited by Sophie Hamacher and Jessica Hankey. MIT Press and Orbis Editions.
Linda Small (2024) The Freedom & Captivity Curriculum Project, in Higher Education and the Carceral State: Transforming Together Annie Buckley. Routledge.
Linda Small, Inside Blue, Poetry in Exchange
Chandler Dugal, Victoria Scott, Linda Small and Mark Van Sickle (January 2024) Implementing Alternative Sentencing, Community Reintegration, and Record Expungement in Maine. Colby College Think Tank.
Linda Small (March 2024) The Freedom & Captivity Curriculum Project in Higher Ed and the Carceral State: Transforming Together, Edited by Annie Buckley. Routledge.
Linda Small and Chandler Dugal (February 20, 2024) Earned Criminal Record Forgiveness Promises a Safe and Economical Second-Chance to Deserving Mainers. Bangor Daily News.
Press coverage
Bangor Daily News Op-ed - Rehabilitation versus punishment: How American prisons contribute to recidivism by Megan Roberts mentions Reentry Sisters as a community resource helping women transition. https://www.bangordailynews.com/2024/07/09/opinion/opinion-contributor/rehabilitation-versus-punishment-american-prisons-recidivism-joam40zk0w/
Recover Loud! with Mackenzie Kelley
Community Voices for Change (WMPG) radio talk show: Interview with Mackenzie Kelley and Linda Small of Reentry Sisters May 2024 https://www.wmpg.org/archive-player/?show_key=mon1300&archive_key=0
and a second episode with Linda Small and Brandon Brown in June 2023 (
Mackenzie Kelley, Maine Morning Star. "A Failure of the system': Over 700 People have died on probation in Maine since 2013" (March 4, 2024)
Colby Justice Think Tank presented their policy papers at National Alliance of Higher Education in Prison Conference in Atlanta and at the Goldfarb Center at Colby College
George Mason University Carter School for Peace and Conflict Resolution - Hope, Renewal, & Rights mini-conference. Guest speakers Linda Small and Reentry Sister Victoria Scott.
Jobs for the Future Blog on gender inequities in prison education written by Linda with the help of many Reentry Sisters.
Left photo: Linda Small at the 6th Annual Second Chance Pell discussing the challenges and possibilities of prison education. Ved Price, Executive Director of the Alliance for Higher Education in Prison (2nd from left) with moderator Amanda Nowak, Senior Program Associate (far right) of Vera Institute of Justice (July 2023)
Additional community connections
Reentry Sisters works in collaboration with the following organizations on advocacy, providing social services and educational opportunities.
- Maine Reentry Network
- Healthy Acadia
- The Center for Effective Public Policy
- Maine Recovery Advocacy Project
- Maine Association of Recovery Residences
- Alliance for Higher Education in Prison
- Formerly Incarcerated College Graduates Network
Opportunities for Formerly Incarcerated People
Reentry Sisters invites you to apply for the following opportunities:
At the Muskie School of Public Service, Portland, Maine
The dee Clarke Justice Fellowship (dCJF) is an introduction for
individuals age 18+ to develop skills in research, policy, and
community engagement. Fellows will work with the Permanent
Commission to design and implement a project of your
choosing that will contribute to positive change for BIPOC
communities in Maine.
DURING THE PROGRAM FELLOWS WILL:
Attend individual and group trainings
Connect and learn with mentors, community leaders,
and peers
Work on real projects to impact change in Maine
Get involved in racial justice, anti-racism, and systems
change work
For more information visit https://pcritp.me/dCJF
Ragdale invites formerly incarcerated artists working in any discipline to apply for the Waud Fellowship. The fellowship recipient will receive funding for an 18-day residency, a $2000 stipend, uninterrupted time, a live/work space, weeknight communal dinners, and the camaraderie of the other committed and passionate residents and fellows at Ragdale. This fellowship is open to emerging and established practitioners. The Waud Fellowship for Formerly Incarcerated Artists is generously funded by David and Pamela Waud.
Fellows are asked to help us reach out to the community by giving a public reading, lecture, open studio, video, or similar type of presentation. These events help to share the Ragdale vision with students, educators, and the general public. Ragdale awards fellowships to emerging and established practitioners based on merit and suitability of practice for public programming in the Ragdale Youth Engagement initiative. Fellows are typically featured in a program within 18-months of their residency.
Application deadline for the Waud Fellowship is 11:59pm on June 30, 2024, for a 2025 residency. $25 application fee. Please reach out to deanna@ragdale.org to request a fee-waived application. Applicants may be awarded a residency without a fellowship. Residency fees are determined by the resident.
Future Freedoms Fellowship for Returning Community Members
The Center on Gender and Extreme Sentencing, a project of the Center for Transformative Action, is seeking two people who are formerly incarcerated to serve as our inaugural Fellows for our Future Freedoms Fellowship. Specifically, we seek to hire two part-time Fellows who have a lived personal experience with the criminal legal system and an interest in social justice advocacy. Those who have not been formerly incarcerated are not qualified for the position. Each Fellow will work together with a team to develop a legal toolkit for incarcerated women.
The Fair Housing Center is excited to announce the launch of our newest online course, Fair Housing 101: Know Your Rights! Enroll in this course to learn about your fair housing rights, including information on reasonable accommodations and modifications for people with disabilities, special topics, and fair housing goals.
All of their online courses are free and self-paced, making it easy to get the training you need from the comfort of your own home, at the pace that works for you. Don't wait — start learning today!
Know Your Rights with this Free Housing Training
The Fair Housing Center for Rights & Research just released our new online self-paced training Fair Housing 101: Know Your Rights. The new training provides an overview of fair housing law, including information on rights for families with children, reasonable accommodations and modifications for persons with disabilities, special topics like criminal record screening, and the goals of fair housing. The training is free and can be completed at one’s own pace. Feel free to share! The link to register is here: https://housingcenter.thinkific.com/courses/fair-housing-101
Free Advocacy Training with Families Against Mandatory Minimums
The Next Training:
Wednesday, May 15, at 6:00 p.m. EDT: https://secure.everyaction.com/v9Ppp1NV6kmt9LVfvEdeBQ2
This month, we will focus on getting educated about your case or your loved one’s case – such an important tool in your advocacy toolbox! Learn from FAMM staff and hear firsthand experiences around gathering documents and resources, and better understand what you need to best advocate for yourselves and your loved ones.
We hope to see you at 6:00 p.m. EDT on Wednesday, May 15! RSVP here: https://secure.everyaction.com/v9Ppp1NV6kmt9LVfvEdeBQ2