The Brief
- 15 women will graduate from a hair-braiding program at Santa Rita Jail; 15 men also graduated from a construction program.
- The two vocational programs signify a shift at Santa Rita to help people find jobs when they are released.
- The programs teach both job skills and emotional strategies.
DUBLIN, Calif. – Nikki Tims was busy learning to braid an intricate dollar sign design on the back of a mannequin’s head at Santa Rita Jail in a pioneering program that she hopes will not only land her a job when she’s released but teach her to control her anger and manage the trauma she’s experienced in her life.
“I learned it’s OK for me to be vulnerable,” she said earlier this week of the inaugural Freedom Braiders program, where stylists teach hair techniques, business skills and emotional strategies to incarcerated women.
Freedom Braiders is part job skills and part therapy, where women learn to work with hair while also chronicling feelings in their journals and participating in activities like writing letters to their 15-year-old selves.…