INTERGENERATIONAL HEALING CIRCLE
YSRP’s Intergenerational Healing Circle centers healing from trauma and builds power among young Black men and former Juvenile Lifers who share the experience of being prosecuted as teenagers in the adult justice system.
YSRP launched the first Circle in March 2020 with 10 participants. Over the course of 20 facilitated bi-weekly virtual sessions, Circle participants engage in dialogues that are reflective, healing and action-oriented. Guest speakers attend sessions to build skills in narrative storytelling, advocacy and media production. Given 2020’s context of global pandemic, ongoing state violence against Black lives, and uprising, building an intergenerational community of individuals with lived experiences of incarceration has become critically important.
The Intergenerational Healing Circle has four core goals: understanding and healing from trauma; creating connectedness rooted in shared experience of incarceration and reentry; developing agency and liberation-oriented leadership; and building collective power.
VIDEOS
In collaboration with Unchained Stories, Intergenerational Healing Circle facilitator Juwan Bennett and participants interviewed one another about the experience of participating in the pilot of YSRP’s Intergenerational Healing Circle. This 2-minute trailer previews a soon-to-be-released longer video featuring in-depth interviews with Circle participants. Unchained Stories led a workshop with Circle participants to introduce them to narrative filmmaking, and then virtually filmed and produced this video in November 2020.
YSRP Reentry Coordinators Juwan Bennett and John Pace joined members of Impact100 Philadelphia at their November 10, 2020 Fall Education series to discuss the work of reentry, partnership and intergenerational healing in the time of COVID-19. In conversation with Monica Justice, Vice President of Impact100 Philly, John & Juwan spoke about the launch of the Intergenerational Healing Circle (IGHCs) that was made possible with a 2019 core mission grant from Impact100. In the hour-long video, John & Juwan discuss how YSRP’s values as a racial justice organization shape the scope and content of the Intergenerational Healing Circle, and our approach to reentry partnership.