Freeminds

I spent my Saturday evening this week making Valentine’s Day cards for a nonprofit organization in DC called Freeminds Book Club & Writing Workshop. They’re one of my favorites. Their origin story is pretty amazing. Co-founder Kelli Taylor was working as a journalist when she received a letter from a young man on death row in Texas. It was 1996, and he had been incarcerated for more than five years for a crime committed when he was 17 years old. Kelli took that story and produced a television documentary about juveniles on death row in America. She and the young man corresponded over the next four years, sharing thoughts about books, among other things. He was executed in 2000, and in 2002, Kelli and colleague Tara Libert founded the Free Minds Book Club & Writing Workshop, launched in the DC Jail.

It began as a bi-weekly book club and writing workshop in the jail, and as Freeminds members were released or transferred to federal prison upon turning 18, Kelli and Executive Director, Tara Libert, developed a system to keep members active via correspondence activities. DC lost their state prison in the early 2000’s, so anyone convicted of a felony serves that time in federal prisons, even though they aren’t technically a federal offender. It’s a weird arrangement, and we can save it for another day, but the fact that Freeminds was committed to maintaining their relationship with these young people as they left their community is the point I want to make today. When I came on the scene, DC decided to move all incarcerated youth under the age of 18 to the youth facility, so I asked Freeminds if they would stay with us and expand to working with adults. They said yes, because that’s who they are. :)

What do you get as a Freeminds member? While you’re in DC, you participate in face-to-face bookclubs. During the pandemic, we offered our APDS virtual classroom app and learning management system to continue in lieu of face-to-face, and their membership grew. Not only do you read books and discuss them, you get to write poetry and participate in writing workshops. Freeminds has a magazine called Connect that publishes members’ works and articles. One of my favorite activities is Write Night. Members mail their poetry to Freeminds staff, and on appointed evenings, anyone in the community can come together to read the poems and comment on them. Literally. Everyone uses a colored pen to write positive comments on each page, which gets sent back to the member. The positive feedback on their writing is important, yes, but the connection to their community is priceless.

When you come home to DC from incarceration, Freeminds is waiting for you, helping you with reentry, offering support, sometimes hiring former members to carry on the work. Twenty years after the inception of Freeminds Book Club and Writing Workshop, their reentry work is as robust as the work they do for incarcerated members. The dedication and talent of the two founders and their growing staff never cease to amaze me.

Nonprofits serve an important function in correctional programming and reentry. We need to celebrate the groups that make a difference, and winnow out the ones who can’t get it together, because there are plenty of those out there too. Kelli and Tara took a vision and mission, put it into action, and not only do they serve their intended population, they’re a force to be reckoned with in the community, continuously advocating for fair treatment, providing opportunities, and reminding all of us of our humanity.

We can use as much of that as we can get.

Hats off to Tara, Kelli, their staff, and all of their members. You can check out their work here.

Enjoy your morning beverage. While you’re there, contemplate how you’re contributing positively to this work of spreading kindness, love, and forgiveness into this crazy world. It’s ours, afterall, so we might as well fill it with as much light as possible.

Cheers!