Parental Incarceration Justice
Our Work: Better Futures MN
Better Futures Minnesota is a nonprofit organization that works with men who were formerly incarcerated with felonies. Better Futures strives to give the men in their program the opportunity to achieve success and make an impact on their community. Better Futures works to help their participants create a better life for themselves, their families, their children, and their community.
While working with a child, her mother had gone to prison. I saw how the absence of her parent impacted her mentally and emotionally. The lack of stability within her family unit caused her to struggle in school. She was impacted finically, because one of her parents was no longer there to support her. Working directly with a child who was experiencing the issue of parental incarceration, made me realize the importance of the issue. I tried to research the topic when I realized the information regarding parental incarceration is lacking. Considering how many children are impacted by parental incarceration there is not nearly enough research that has been done on it.
I decided to take matters into my own hands, through my experience at Better Futures I was able to work directly with men who had experienced the issue of parental incarceration. I interviewed four men about their experiences with parental incarceration. Every man I interviewed had a least one child while they were in prison. The experiences they shared included, if they stayed in contact with their children, how they stayed in contact with their children, how long they went without being their children, how they supported their children while being in prison, who there children were living with at the time, and how there children were directly impact due to them being in prison.
Through these interviews I was able to learn a significant amount more than I was able to from research alone. I created a document including the information I learned from the interviews and from my research. To read more click here: