“Love is a battlefield full of loyalty and lessons.
Open to the soul your decision whether you want to let it in or let it go.
Vicious through the flesh bursting out in flames, you said you love me, I’ll take it to the grave.
Enough with all the hate, the scars we have we can’t erase, the love we always debate, we will choose love over hate.”
Paige Harrison
"What lies about myself do I need to let go of." Nikki Weaver
"What can you release" Tausha Monroe, Coffee Creek Correctional
"Create your Giving Tree" Atieno Bird, Virginia
"Create your Giving Tree" Atieno Bird, Virginia
Summer George
Zoe Tanner, NY
Paige Harrison What does fear look like."
"Create the light and darkness in your life" Paige Harrison, Coffee Creek Correctional Facility
Zoe Tanner, NY
Imprisonment, Caroline Cox, Oregon
"Draw yourself in the ocean surrounded by your boundaries" Eva Perez Coffee Creek Correctional
Freedom
Marie Gonzalez
"Draw yourself in the ocean surrounded by your boundaries"
" What do you choose to challenge" - Anonymous, Oregon
I am not enough, Scarlett Eastman, California
"Create your Giving Tree" -Meghan Elliot
Tessa, Nebraska Womens Facility
Collaborated Love Poem, Nebraska Correctional Center for Women 2022
Anonymous: The Different Sides of You
First Year at On The Inside
April 14, 2021, is our one-year-old nonprofit birthday. A short recap here for you to take in:
-All fifteen Board of Directors (all female-identifying) came together from 4 different countries, time zones,
and life experiences to connect through this work.
-With an all-volunteer
power team, we applied for 3 grants and received full funding for each of them.
-We grew our work from one state to three states with an opportunity to serve up to 2,200 female
identifying folks.
-We offered eight four-class series, and gave out twelve full scholarships to those in need.
-We received funding to produce our first book, Breaking Down Barriers, with incarcerated women at
Coffee Creek Correctional Facility and women on the outside.
-We began meeting monthly with those that have shared in the four class series work, and have met
monthly for 8 consecutive months.
-We filmed 3 videos with our women on the inside: joy, resilience, & an intro to theatre with Dr.Lisa
Collins, Joy Suulivan, and Nikki Weaver.
-We hired Caroline as our Book Project Manager, added her to our Board of Directors, and invited her into
the fold as a paid staff member.
-We rented our first creative space on April 1, just days before our birthday.
“I have learned to deal with my trauma. Not just to deal with it but to keep coming back and working on it. I also learned that even when things are uncomfortable it’s nice to have people on your side. I’ve learned to set boundaries and not be embarrassed to share them with others. I want to leave courage and hope for girls to succeed in the future not just here but as they live their life. I’m taking with me the good and the bad. It brought lots of memories.”
Second Year at On The Inside
April 14, 2022, is our second birthday. Here is a short recap of what we have accomplished in our second
year of birth:
-Since 2021, all fifteen Board of Directors (all female-identifying) came together from 4 different countries,
time zones, and life experiences to connect and grow through this work.
-In late 2021, we began working with the Wyoming Women’s Center by sharing our work over Zoom and
teaching a room full of women weekly in an 8 class series covering topics such as: light and darkness,
mischief, sisterhood, ancestry, connection, love, and showing up. Each class offers women the
opportunity to share their voices, move their bodies, connect to their emotional life, and create art in a
supportive environment. Our work grew to begin offering a monthly class to all the caseworkers that serve
these women.
“We give ourselves permission to be who we are.”
““This class has given me a safe place to be vulnerable. It has given me a place to truly just be me with no judgment or condemnation. This class has given me a sisterhood. Thank you.”
-In late 2021, we also visited the Nebraska Correctional Center for Women and began offering a weekly
creative newsletter that incarcerated adults could respond to with stories, art, poetry, and letters. Over
365 women are housed at this facility.
-Our outside monthly class has gathered 20 times to learn, support, and play together. This group serves
women who have never been inside a facility to those who have been released after serving time.
Together, we navigate life, make art, and support our well-being.
-In 2022, Carol Cox, Project Manager, and myself were badged to begin teaching inside the Nebraska
Facility. We now offer a weekly class to 20+ women with a plan to offer our work in an ongoing way. We
plan to teach in person every other month and hope to train facilitators on the ground at this facility.
-Our work has grown from one state to three states serving up to 2,200 female-identifying folks through
weekly classes, weekly newsletters, and in-person and Zoom instruction.
-Outside classes have served more than 60 women in up to 6 countries, many of whom continue to
connect in our monthly class series.
-Recently, the Wyoming Community Foundation awarded us $5000 for the work we are doing in this state.
This grant will support our ongoing work with incarcerated women and caseworkers.
“This class has given me a passion for art and poetry I thought I had lost.”
-2022 has expanded our work in ways that surprised us. Our weeks are FULL of classes and
conversations like these, that enrich our hearts and broaden our scope on humanity.
-Together, with your support we are reaching further and further through patience and persistence with
current goals to expand into Zimbabwe, Australia, and New Mexico. We have women on the ground in all
of these locations who are getting to know their local leaders, who are advocating for women's rights, and
who believe in the power of creativity to expand, heal, and transform the lives of our incarcerated sisters.
Third Year at On The Inside
April 14, 2023, we turned three and now serve women and youth in 6 US facilities. We currently serve
women and youth at the following facilities:
-Nebraska Correctional Center for Women: weekly classes and monthly classes
-Wyoming Women’s Center (and youth facility): weekly classes with a plan to add our monthly class
-Women’s Eastern Reception Diagnostic and Correctional Center for Women, Missouri: weekly classes
-Coffee Creek Correctional Facility, Oregon: weekly classes
-Virginia Correctional Center for Women: an 8-week class
-We now employ 5 facilitators in 5 different states, two of whom were formerly incarcerated and
participated in our work while serving time.
-Guest author, Reema Zaman visited Coffee Creek Correctional to share her memoir, I Am Yours, which
our class prior to her visit.
-In 2023, we visited all six of these facilities at least twice to teach in-person workshops to current and
past students, as well as offered classes to those interested in our work.
-Our outside monthly class has continued to grow to more and more women as they are released from
facilities. This group serves women who have never been inside a facility to those who have been
released after serving time. Together, we navigate life, make art, and support our well-being.
-Outside the facility, we teach an ongoing four-class series four times per calendar year to any person (age,
race, sexual orientation, etc) as well as offer a bi-weekly group open to anyone affected by the system, as
well as host a monthly drop-in Zoom class open to anyone who has completed our 4 or 8 class series.
-Our outside classes have served more than 80 women in up to 8 countries, many of whom continue to
connect in our monthly class series.
-We ended 2023 by being awarded funding from: Regional Arts and Culture Council, The Akhilanda
Women's Foundation, Oregon Cultural Trust, and Twin Peaks Foundation.
-In 2024, we have plans to expand into Australian facilities.
“I found love in myself and I didn’t have that a year ago”
Fourth Year at On The Inside
-We started work at our first international facility, Tarrengower Prison in rural Victoria, Australia.
-We now have five female/they/them facilitators working with us, two who were formerly incarcerated
students of ours.
-We continue to see more of our inside students released and join our classes and workshops outside of
prison.
“I’ve never taken my time down seriously, the 3rd time I’ve been here.
This class is really helping me to take a look at myself.”
“I started to believe that I can survive in this place.”
Thank you for believing in the power of our work.
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Our final four class series of 2022 have just opened for women outside facilities, you can attend from your home anywhere in the world.
This is for anyone interested in the work, you don't have to have been a former felon. Our work is led by two women, one formerly incarcerated, and myself, the two of us met while Carol was incarcerated. We are real, dreamers, laughers, and truth-tellers who invite you to join us on this wild ride of life wholeheartedly.
Our work shares our facilitation style inside prison and builds long-lasting community, empathy, creative work, and listening skills in just 4 classes. We are currently building a team of women interested in facilitating this work inside other women's prisons.
Sign up today and join our growing collective of female-identifying voices inside and outside prison facilities coming together to create, listen, learn, move, and make. We are beginning expansion into Virginia and Ireland THIS Fall, so now is a great time to join our class series.
Recent feedback:
-"This is the best class I've ever taken. Thank you for being here." -Nebraska Correctional Center for Women
-"I reinforce the openness and honesty that this class brings." -Nebraska Correctional Center for Women
-"I've been an addict for 24 years, I've never done anything sober. I am at a huge turning point in my life." -Wyoming Women's Center
Inside, we have offered our work to 2,200 women in three states (classes, newsletters, audio, and video recordings), created over 60 newsletters for women inside, and monthly teach the caseworkers at one of our facilities.
Inside the facility, we teach 11 women weekly in Wyoming (covid number max), and monthly the caseworkers at this facility. In Oregon, we are waiting for our in-person weekly classes to begin again any day now, we serve 1600 women and trans folks at this facility. In Nebraska, we teach a group of 22 women (max for covid number currently) weekly in an ongoing 8-class series. Next month, we will lead two full days of in-person work in NE and WY together.
We will bring home much of this work to share at our backyard fundraising event on September 11 at 9:30 am PT-12 pm in my backyard- Stepping Forward: remembering our past, honoring our future forward. You'll hear stories from the women inside, see their artwork, and have their words read aloud to you. At this event, you'll also have the opportunity to start your day with yoga, nibble on some yummy things made by our Board Members, and hear some beautiful music by Elke Robitaille. It'll be a sweet, deeply meaningful event. The suggested donation for this event is $50, you can make that donation here. For more info, please send me an email. This event is in person only.
This Fall we head to NE and WY to facilitate in person over two days, and this summer we are working in Boston to facilitate at an art studio, Create Art In Community, where we are bridging the gap between women inside prison and women outside as we build community and conversation through art making practices.