Counseling Mediation and Educational Center Inc

My Dad is in Prison.  I Don’t Deserve to Be!

Since 2001, The Counseling, Mediation, and Educational Center, a 501 C 3 nonprofit organization in Sanford, Florida has worked with Children of Incarcerated Parents. I started the nonprofit 11 years ago when my son’s father was sent to prison.  I was clueless about the population in which my son and I were now involved.  Although I was a therapist I was curious and concerned about the challenges my son now faced as a result of his dad’s incarceration.   I quickly learned that the information and research about children of incarcerated parents was limited. I remember asking myself, “How many other children are left behind due to parental incarceration?”  "According to the US Department of Justice, Bureau of Justice Statistics August 2008, there were 809,800 incarcerated parents of 1.7 MILLION minor children.”  Yes this is America's silent epidemic!  And what was even more amazing was that I already knew so many in my own community. 

As a parent and as a therapist I needed to know more.  The statistics about the number of children who were left behind and what happened to them frightened me. I learned that it is estimated that 75% of children who have an incarcerated parent will be incarcerated at some point in their lives.  My son could not be a statistic!   As a mother I was fully aware that I had to do something to save my son. As a therapist I had to do something to save the other children who were just like him.    

I struggled to develop and create ways to ensure my son would not be a statistic or a victim of intergenerational incarceration.  My reality prompted me to pursue my PhD in Human Services with a focus on social and community services.  Although risky because of the limited research that existed, I chose to complete my PhD on Children of Incarcerated Parents.  The research involved in pursuing my PhD gave me a different outlook on these children, their parents, their families, and their future.    Therefore, for the next 11 years we have used the arts, equine therapy, talk therapy, jewelry classes, volunteering, and group field trips to address the various issues that exist for these children and to provide opportunities for success. The Stepping Stones Program originally was a group of ideas that started out as a plan to help my son, has now helped hundreds of other children.   

Research indicates that children of incarcerated parents are traumatized by separation from their parents, confused by the parent's actions, and stigmatized by the shame of their parent's situation.  Children of incarcerated parents will experience many emotions throughout their parent's incarceration. These feelings may include sadness, anger, confusion, guilt, shame, stress and loneliness. Deprived of income and guidance, these children are vulnerable to poverty, to stressful shifts in caregivers, separation from siblings, more likely to be incarcerated, academic failure, and other family disruptions. 

Current Issues and Goals for our Stepping Stones program:

1.      Currently we provide counseling services that include equine (horse) therapy, pet therapy (goats, tortoises, and rabbits) gardening, fishing, horseback riding, and other outdoor activities.  However, our utilization of our animals and our outdoor programs are limited because we do not own the property.  All of our animals and programs are located at various locations throughout Central Florida.  This is costly and extremely time consuming to our staff and to our volunteers and limits the number of children we can service. Our goal for our counseling services is to centralize our animals and programs to one area.  This will allow our clients to choose which form of therapy they’d like to try and give them an opportunity to discover what their interests are and what they are good at. While many of our children are attracted to animals others are attracted to gardening or art.

 2.      We are unable to accept generous contributions to help us build facilities from various groups or individuals for our programs because the property in which the animals are located does not belong to us.  For example, we have a donor willing to build us a barn and storage facility for our program.  However the facility and barn would be built on someone else’s property.  It would not belong to us. Our goal is to allow our volunteers and donors to build the necessary facilities for our programs.  To create an environment that is safe and manageable for our pets, children, therapists, and volunteers.

3.      Since our beginning in 2001 the cost of summer camps and the number of children enrolled has increased.  This past year our agency paid over 15,000 dollars to send our children to various camps that provide activities for our clients.  Although the camps are fun for our children, these camps have not been structured to address the many issues that they face.  Our financial resources are limited which limits how many children we can send to camp and how often they can attend. Our goal for our camps is to allow our children to bond and to recognize that they are not alone and to provide them with an opportunity to work on the clinical issues that exist due to their parent's incarceration.  In addition to therapeutic goals, our children are exposed to and learn to appreciate nature and teamwork.  Our goal is to offer more programs at the camps that would include architectural building skills, electrical skills, and plumbing skills, in addition to increasing the numbers of children who want to attend. We want our camps to be free to the children who need to attend them.

 4.      The communication/visitation component of our program is to allow children who have an incarcerated parent contact or visitation with that incarcerated parent. First and foremost not all children who have an incarcerated parent should have contact or visitation with that incarcerated parent.  However, there are many children who had a relationship with their parent before they were incarcerated.  Having a positive relationship with the incarcerated parent is good for the child and the parent (when appropriate).   Our goal is to improve and maintain communication between their children and their parents.  Visitation is only one of our means to maintain this communication.  We also strongly encourage communication via letters and telephone calls. Studies show that prisoners who maintain family connections have a better chance at success when they are released.  No contact with their child during their incarceration will probably result in very little contact with their children after being released.  We strive to offer incarcerated parents a program that will increase their awareness of the importance of being in their child’s life.  

The Purchase: Our campaign is to purchase a new property in Seminole County, Florida to be used to serve Children of Incarcerated Parents.  The property consists of 22 acres which includes a concrete dwelling for groups and workshops, a barn for our therapeutic pets, a large pond for fishing, a large area for gardening.

The cost of the property that we are trying to purchase is $200,000. We are asking for $1.00 for each individual that has been impacted by incarceration.  Yes that is correct $1.00.  If ever there was a campaign that you could participate in this is it!

We need those who have been impacted by incarceration to support our efforts to keep breaking the cycle of family/intergenerational incarceration. 

This can be done! According to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) 2,266,800 adults were incarcerated in the U.S. federal and state prisons, and county jail at year end of 2011.  As of 2008, there were 98,192 people held in the Florida State Prison, placing the state third in the nation in its incarcerated population, trailing only California and Texas.  Our goal is to end family incarceration.  Remember, the US has over 2 million incarcerated people each year! All we need is 1 dollar from 200 thousand people that have been impacted by it!

This site requires a minimum of a 10.00 donation and we will accept it, however if you only have a dollar please mail it to P.O. Box 52, Sanford, Florida, 32771. 

The benefits of purchasing this property:

1. All of our children will have the privacy to benefit from all of our programs. 2. All of our children we have the opportunity to be more involved with our equine and other pet programs. 3. More children will be allowed to attend various camps on a more consistent basis. 4. Our ability to allow volunteers to assist/commit to our children and our programs would increase. 5. Our agency would be able to take advantage of donations that are given to use to create a property that is appropriate for therapy in an outdoor setting. 6. Our finances would greatly improve to support the other agency programs to our children which include parent child visitation and scholarship opportunities.