EDITOR'S CORNER

We continue our focus on industry innovators with a spotlight on a woman who used her experience behind bars to help connect families shattered by incarceration. Her determination has helped children bond with their imprisoned parents, made inmates recognize their wrongs, and has earned her national accolades.
Jim, Corrections.com editor

FEATURED STORY

Helping the children heroes

By Ann Coppola

Connecting through film and determination

When Carolyn LeCroy was incarcerated for fourteen months in a Virginia prison she thought of herself as one of the lucky ones. Her two sons, ages 18 and 20, gave her joy and hope by driving the long trip in to see her on visitation days. The love and support from her family kept her spirits up, but looking around, LeCroy could see there were plenty of incarcerated parents who were not so fortunate.

“My children came to see me all the time,” she says, “and there would be women who never got visits. And I would look at them and think if they are this unhappy, what about the children?”

Before her arrest, LeCroy had a career as a television and advertising producer. When she was released on parole in 1996, she decided to use her background in film and video to help inmate parents and their children.

In December of 1999, she and volunteer camera crews were granted admission to the Fluvanna Correctional Center for Women in Troy, Virginia. They recorded video messages with inmate mothers and mailed the messages to their children and families as Christmas gifts. Read this week's full story.

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READER FEEDBACK

Regarding Allow cell phone jamming
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EVENTS

Prisoner Re-entry Webinar
Thursday, January 29 - 3:00 - 4:30pm EST

Join Social Solutions for an educational webinar on the Maryland Re-Entry Partnership program for ex-offenders, with Catholic Charities of Central Maryland. REP's program manager will share how it's measuring and managing the effectiveness of its nonprofit services that helps men leaving prison make a positive transition to their neighborhoods.

They will discuss:

• Self-sufficiency measures implemented as indicators to preventing recidivism, a result of reassessing and refocusing program outcomes.


• Gaining staff buy-in to support these changes and committing to collecting and using data that will have a meaningful impact.


• Leveraging this approach to take steps toward becoming a performance management driven organization.

You will learn how REP captures participants' progress toward achieving outcomes and tracking service delivery with ETO Software — and use this information to assess impact and to manage staff.

Space is limited so RSVP today!