Impact of Social Context on Educational Organizations: Freedom Education Project Puget Sound

College Education for Incarcerated Women & Gender Nonconforming People in Washington

FEPPS Map

Why Women & GNC folks?

“This is extremely important because these populations are historically underrepresented in the academic

Alyssa Knight

Co-Founder of FEPPS

arena…Because the women’s population is always a smaller number than men, less money gets funneled into the prison designated for women for things such as supporting programming.”

Intersectionality & Oppression ● Intersectionality describes unique experiences of discrimination and privilege due to overlapping social identities (Anderson). ● “The prejudice and discrimination of one group against another, backed by institutional power. Oppression occurs when one group is able to enforce its prejudice and discrimination throughout society because it controls institutions” (Sensoy & DiAngelo, 61).

Stereotype Threat Women in prison may experience stereotype threat because….of the harmful stigma that incarcerated cannot make progress in their education and are more likely to fail.

FEPPS lessens the threat of stereotype threat by…. offering incarcerated women and providing them the necessary resources to further their education.

Decolonialized Curriculum

Empowerment

Courses challenge “ traditional, Eurocentric narratives that silence…the existence, experiences, knowledge production, and creativities of Black, Indigenous, and People of Color”

Teaches power as a significant part of a creative learning community and as “energy, capacity, and potential” rather than domination.

Classroom as Community

Leadership

The classroom emphasizes a sense of understanding and connection and teaches students a sense of responsibility for not only their own learning, but others as well.

Students gain leadership qualities through their participation in class. The teacher serving as a role model in developing a community among students and providing them leadership skills to complete their tasks

Classroom as Contested Space

Healing-Engaged Education

A contested space is “open to conflict…simultaneous truths…and incorporates personal experience”

Includes a methodology that turns toward community based collaborative projects that promote wellness, wholeness, and well-being.

How FEPPS Serves this Population

Inequities in Education

“When bodies are constructed as problematic, [they] are vulnerable to a cascade of negative social, emotional, economic, and educational consequences and thereby experience diminished capacities to access material, social, economic, and emotional resources” (Miller, 72).

Secondary Question ● Accessibility to prison

Are there obstacles that stand in the way of FEPPS’ mission?

● Limited access to materials and technology ● Laws and rules in place that prohibit formerly incarcerated peoples to lecture or work at the WCCW (Alyssa Knight Interview)

Design Justice Principles

Why does FEPPS matter? ● The GLSEN Report recommends the “urgent need for action to create safe and affirming learning environments for LGBTQ students” (GLSEN National School Climate Report, 2019) ● Offer healing-engaged education and decolonial curriculum ● Shifts the way we think about the criminal justice system

“FEPPS literally changed the trajectory of my life…Education has provided me the ability to think critically and it has taught me to trust myself and my mind, which is a asset that cannot be taken away from me.”

– Anonymous FEPPS Alum

Works Cited Anderson, Kate. “Kimberlé Crenshaw at Ted + Animation.” YouTube, 17 May 2017, youtu.be/JRci2V8PxW4?si=cTTvg5uP4MStbVZa. Accessed 10 Nov. 2023.

Anonymous FEPPS Alum. Interview. Conducted by Finn Ledford-White. November 3, 2023.

Couloute, Lucius and Dan Kopf. 2018. Out of Prison & Out of Work: Unemployment Among Formerly Incarcerated People. Prison Policy Initiative.

Accessed 10 Nov. 2023.

Department of Corrections, Washington State, Education Services. Improving Public Safety by Building Successful Transitions Into Our Community.

Education Fact Sheet. Department of Corrections, Washington State, October 2023, https://doc.wa.gov/docs/publications/400-GU026.pdf Education Report. Accessed 10 Nov. 2023.

Design Justice Network. “Design Justice Network Principles.” Design Justice Network, 2018, designjustice.org/read-the-principles. Accessed 10 Nov. 2023.

FEPPS. Freedom Education Project Puget Sound, www.fepps.org/mission-values.

Knight, Alyssa. Interview. Conducted by Finn Ledford-White. November 3, 2023.

Kosciw, J. G., Clark, C. M., Truong, N. L., & Zongrone, A. D. (2020). The 2019 National School Climate Survey: The experiences of lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer youth in our nation’s schools. New York: GLSEN. Not In Our School. “Stereotype Threat: A Conversation with Claude Steele.” YouTube, 18 July 2013, youtu.be/failylROnrY?si=PiEwLGuMEAl1qY4z.

Accessed 10 Nov. 2023.

Sensoy, Özlem , and Robin J Diangelo. Is Everyone Really Equal? : An Introduction to Key Concepts in Social Justice Education. 2nd ed., New York, Teachers College Press, 2017.

Miller, sj. “Reframing Schooling to Liberate Gender Identity.” Multicultural Perspectives, vol. 20, no. 2, 2018, pp. 70–80, https://doi.org/10.1080/15210960.2018.1447067.

Thank you!

Presentation By: Ariadna Angeles, Cecilia Negash, Finn Ledford-White, & Sumika Yanadori