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Lifelong Information for Entrepreneurs at Mercy Corps Northwest

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In a world where a felony conviction seems insurmountable and hope seems slim, we see the human potential for positive change. 

Mercy Corps Northwest’s  Lifelong Education for Entrepreneurs (LIFE)  is a program that centralizes around supporting women who are incarcerated via offering small business education inside of prisons (LIFE Inside) and continuing that support post release (LIFE Outside).

LIFE Inside is a 32 weeks of accredited training focused on life skills, job skills and business planning while empowering participants to develop an entrepreneurial mindset and leveraging the potential of self-employment promote self-sufficiency, resilience, and economic stability. When women graduate from this program, they are equipped with an amended business plan, transition plan, certificate of achievement and two versions of their resume. Along with coursework and mentoring support, MCNW offers an innovative matched savings program that encourages both the fiscal discipline of saving toward a goal, and provides resources for successful reentry. 

LIFE Outside  is in the very beginning of its life cycle. We hope to pilot an innovative, groundbreaking, response to the needs of individuals who have been recently released from prison. The dream is to pilot a business that creates change in our community generates sustaining revenue to the LIFE Program.

The future of the LIFE program is bright. 

We have a few initiatives that your donation today will support:

  1. Expand the audience that participates in LIFE Inside. LIFE Inside will soon launch session 16 of this curriculum. Historically, 25-30 women at a time are able to participate in this 32 week session. Our hope is that within CY 2019, we grow this number to 50-100 individuals participating in LIFE Inside. For the first time in the history of the program, we hope to launch 2-3 co-occurring LIFE Inside sessions. Two of these sessions will be inside Oregon’s only Women’s correctional facility and one of these sessions will be at a new facility located in Portland. This expansion of the LIFE Inside project is a direct response to an overwhelming need for business education inside of prison in addition to the amount of applications we receive per session. For example, for the most recent LIFE Inside session, we received 65 applications to fill 25-30 seats.

  2. In addition to piloting 1 or 2 additional LIFE Inside sessions, we are currently working with two local organizations (Growing Gardens  and  Mudbone Grown) to create a new curriculum that marries garden/farm education with business education. Growing gardens, among other initiatives, runs and operates each prison garden in the state of Oregon (in 13/14 prisons) and has committed itself to serving every member of our community through a lense of racial equity. Mudbone Grown is a minority-women-veteran owned startup that believes in creating kinship, cultural pride and self-sufficiency through the cultivation of land ownership and land use. The creation of this new curriculum opens up the possibility of an entirely new population that can benefit from the LIFE Inside curriculum.

  3. Pilot the sale of the LIFE Inside curriculum. Mercy Corps Northwest receives about 2 inquiries per month from individuals, organizations and correctional institutions around the country seeking the pilot the LIFE Inside curriculum at their desired location. We would love to fulfill this need for our global and local community by allowing entities to purchase and utilize the LIFE Inside curriculum at will.

  4. Launch LIFE Outside. This initiative is both a response to the loss of the Mercy Corps Northwest Reentry Transition Center and to the growing prison population in Oregon. The RTC served many who were recently released from prison via a peer led and supportive model. Our hope is to continue to offer services to recently released individuals. It is important to our team that our response to this growing crisis is innovative and creates lasting change in the lives of the people we serve, therefore creating change in the local community, families, and the region at large. The dream is this: a social enterprise that employs LIFE Inside graduates, offers supportive management, incentivises education, and is a launching pad to the greater employment market. 

The expansion efforts of the LIFE program can and should not be done alone.  

None of this could have been or will be done without the support of our community. 

Thanks to everyone who has been with us along the journey and all who join us today.

Here are some examples of how every dollar we contribute helps people survive and transform their communities.

  • $87 can provide 1 week of LIFE Inside class to someone who is incarcerated.
  • $90 can provide 1 week of garden materials inside of Coffee Creek, bringing fresh produce to the plates of incarcerated women. 
  • $200 can provide 1 week of staff time to support garden apprentices inside of Coffee Creek
  • $1,400 can help provide staff time to expand the LIFE program exponentially.
  • $2,800 can send 1 person through the LIFE Inside class, providing hope for a daunting future.  

Together with Mercy Corps Northwest, we can build thriving communities by providing education, financing and advocating for equitable opportunities— now, and for the future.
 
 On behalf of incarcerated people in Oregon and their families who are counting on our support — Thank you!