Inside-Out in Oregon Campus Publication

This Inside-Out Program in Oregon received some excellent press this week in the magazine Oregon Quarterly.  The article includes testimony from James, one of the most involved Inside alumni at the Oregon State Penitentiary. 

Check out the article on pages 16-17 here!

If your local Inside-Out classes have received media coverage, please let us know so we can publicize it!  Email us a link at nationalinsideoutalumni@gmail.com, or post a comment here. 

Alumni guidelines documents coming soon

A few of us at the national level are working to create a set of guidelines and "best practices" for future alumni programs.  We want to help all alumni be involved and feel welcome to add insite and innovation to the national program.  We are working on guidelines for projects that involve both inside and outside alumni, and specific rules about the No Contact policy and how that will allow for "programmatic contact." 

We are also compiling the experience and suggestions of the projects that have already been started (like the Oregon Book Club) to help inspire people in the creation of future projects.  We've learned, for example, that the alumni groups often need one or two point people to get the ball rolling, but that additional structure means that more people start getting involved.  We also know that it really, really helps to receive recognition and support for projects from the Inside-Out Program itself.  That's one place where the national Alumni Group can help.

Hopefully, groups will start coming together across the country very soon.  We'll have instructions and guidelines ready for them.

In the meantime, if you have any questions or suggestions for what belongs in this document, please contact us by commenting on this post, or by emailing us at nationalinsideoutalumni@gmail.com. 

Chatty Cathy Gets Turned Inside-Out

Sure, I can tell anyone my favorite smell or a movie star I wouldn't mind portraying me in the biography of my life. Orange blossoms and Natalie Portman. See? I don't even know who you are and I'm fine telling you that.

Ask me what it means to forgive someone, ask me about someone I haven't forgiven, ask me about someone I need to ask forgiveness from? And the normally Chatty Cathy in me gets a little less chatty.

Usually, that is.

Unless, for some reason, it's an Inside-Out program and the people surrounding me are participants of a Creative Writing Workshop at Oregon State Penitentiary.

Then it's a different case entirely.

Then we're beginning a day-long conversation and we don't have time to waste on surface-level stuff. We're diving in without a moment to lose.

We were blessed to have Sister Helen Prejean with us for the morning. She shared her own experiences with writing, forgiveness and of course, Cajun jokes.

The energy of the room swelled with her presence and the ease of her conversation and the cadence of her speech warmed our hearts like a good dish of jambalaya.

We sat, inspired and touched, listening to her speak, and then we got to our own writings.

The sharing that followed was a church service in the holiest of temples. Who knew? At a prison. People read their pain out loud. Read their doubt. Read their brokenness, their struggles, their anger.

And in that room on the top floor of the maximum security prison in Oregon, there was peace.

Laughter. Joy. Sharing. And who can say? But I wouldn't doubt that there was quite a bit of hurt that started healing too.

Inside-Out gets me every time. Takes my Chatty Cathy nature and turns it, well, inside out. I'm not just moving my mouth to fill the quiet, but I'm listening attentively and speaking openly with my fellow students.

Ask me about forgiveness? And I'll tell you to take an Inside-Out class.