What if every time you fired up your new VarioPrint i300+ high-speed sheetfed inkjet press or ran a piece through your CP Bourg Digital Finishing Line, you were changing someone’s life forever? This is the excitement of working for PRIDE Enterprises, a Florida-based business that runs vocational training programs for inmates in the Florida Department of Corrections.
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Throughout the state of Missouri, Missouri Vocational Enterprises Correctional Industries operates in 12 correctional institutions in 22 industries and services, including woodworking, consumable products, and clothing and textiles. Incarcerated individuals in training programs can earn a 2,000-hour to 8,000-hour certificate with the Department of Labor. Across the state, there are 1,255 men and women employed through the program and Willie Henderson, in photo on the left, is one of these men. “I get a joy out of the things that I have learned and helping other people learn and grow,” Henderson says. “The potential that they have. It’s exciting because when I first came to prison, I wanted to do something; I wanted to learn, and I wanted to better myself, and I wanted to get better at what I wanted to do. So I chose the factory. … I stuck with it, and I’ve been in the factory for 16 years now, and it’s been a pleasure working with the guys that come through the door and helping them learn and grow into their potential. It’s just been good.”
Securus Technologies’ Lantern helps a former incarcerated individual pursue a reentry profession. Securus’ Lantern learning management and education platform in partnership with Ashland University provides nearly 70 courses for incarcerated individuals to be able to achieve either a bachelor’s or associate’s degree. Since its inception, this change making technology has given over 170,000 incarcerated residents, the opportunity to get a university education to help prepare them for a successful reentry.
This profile focuses on Tyrone Rogers who was released from the Northern Regional Correctional Facility in West Virginia in April of 2018. He is pursuing his bachelor’s degree in communications with specific career goals. “I would like to be a site director for a college reentry program or a counselor to help men and women who want to better themselves,” said Rogers. “I would like to help people do something positive with their lives.”
CI in the News
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