PRISON FELLOWSHIP ACADEMY
Located in select prisons across the country, the Prison Fellowship Academy® is an intensive, biblically based program that takes incarcerated men and women through a holistic life transformation process. Participants are guided by Prison Fellowship staff and volunteers to lead lives of purpose and productivity inside and outside of prison.
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BUILDING SAFER COMMUNITIES—ONE TRANSFORMED LIFE AT A TIME
A cornerstone program of Prison Fellowship, the Academy guides participants to identify the life-controlling issues that led to their incarceration and take responsibility for its impact on their community. Using biblically based materials, the Academy specifically targets criminal thinking and behavior, life skills, addictions, victim impact, and prosocial culture change. The Academy aims to develop prisoners who have leadership potential to serve as positive peer mentors and supporters of a positive culture, based on Gospel-centered values, throughout prison systems. Those who complete the program and are preparing for release will have the opportunity to connect to post-release resources and support in metropolitan areas.
PROGRAM OVERVIEW
12 months of day & evening content | Referrals to post-release resources and services | Course topics include:
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Criminogenic Needs: Participants will address eight basic thinking errors to alter irresponsible attitudes and behaviors that contribute to criminal behavior.
Relationships: Participants will learn ways to establish and maintain healthy, God-centered relationships, examine the roles and responsibilities of being a responsible family member, and better understand the role feelings play in day-to-day life.
Life Skills and Reentry: Participants will complete a personal transition plan targeting skills needed for successful living, including financial responsibility, time management, healthy habits, legal issues, employment, and coping skills.
Addictions and Recovery: Participants will establish personal tools to identify their relapse pattern, warning signs, and relapse prevention to interrupt negative patterns and maintain responsible living. Celebrate Recovery, a Christ-focused recovery program, gives participants an opportunity to confront life's "hurts, habits, and hang-ups" from a Gospel-centered perspective.
Spiritual Formation: Participants will complete Exercising My Faith modules, providing a Christian discipleship track for those of the Christian faith. When participants have a non-Christian religious preference, the Academy helps them apply universal truths found in the Bible to their lives. The Alpha course gives all participants a forum to explore the basics of the Christian faith.
DARRYL'S STORY
Darryl was selling marijuana by the time he was in junior high. He graduated to smoking and selling crack cocaine until, at last, he landed a 50-year sentence. Faced with the prospect of spending his adult life in a prison cell, Darryl realized he needed to make some serious changes.
He turned his life over to Jesus Christ and enrolled in the Prison Fellowship Academy. "This program really instilled in me the tools I needed to operate back in society," Darryl says. In 2002 he was paroled and found a job through one of the volunteers he met at the Academy. In 2004 Darryl returned to the prison as a volunteer. He later joined the Academy staff as a program counselor, finally assuming the role of director in 2016. He now helps incarcerated men prepare for lives of purpose, productivity, and realized potential whether inside or outside of prison.
THE 10-YEAR VISION FOR THE
PRISON FELLOWSHIP ACADEMY
A 10-year, $200-million commitment to transform corrections systems by putting 40 years of critical insights into action across America by our 50th anniversary.
END THE CYCLE OF RECIDIVISM
With YOUR help today, we can reclaim broken lives. We can send men and women who have been transformed by God's grace back into their communities with the Gospel's message of forgiveness, restoration and new life.