Embracing Technology on the Inside
“I wish I could call my dad whenever I have something I want to tell him; instead, I have to wait ‘til he calls me, and that’s really hard.” Sally’s dad is in prison, and she expressed these thoughts about contact with her father during a session with her Person Shaped Support (PSS) worker. PSS […]
The Hardest of Journeys
I took a call on the Families Outside Helpline last week from a man planning to visit his newly sentenced fiancée in prison to tell her that her mother had died that morning. Understandably, he wanted to tell her face to face that same day and, having managed to make the necessary arrangements with the […]
Putting Teachers Behind Bars
32 student teachers went to prison last week – but not because of any crime they had committed. They found themselves inside HMP Edinburgh as part of a new initiative which aims to help teachers (and those in training) explore the impact that the imprisonment of a close relative can have on children and to […]
Alex from Sesame Street
Every so often we read a story that makes us want to high five the world. This is one of them. The makers of Sesame Street have a policy of making all children feel like they’re represented in each of the episodes. And they’re well aware that over 100,000 kids in the area of New […]
Mothers of Bedford
Women are the fastest growing population in today’s U.S. prisons and 80 percent of those women are mothers of school-aged children. This is an alarming figure and one that piqued the interest of Jenifer McShane, who after much research, decided to direct the documentary, “Mothers of Bedford.” The film examines the question: Is it possible […]
