Stacey Borden: on trauma, COVID, and clemency for incarcerated women

In this interview, Stacey Borden, M.Ed., LADC l, discusses her path from incarceration to community leader and how she now works to help incarcerated women change their lives. She is the Founder and President of New Beginnings, Re-entry Services. She has a Master’s Degree in Mental Health Counseling with a Concentration in Addictions and Trauma. She is an author, performance artist, motivational speaker, and activist.

Borden is currently a Board member with OWLL (On With Living and Learning) Productions, a non-profit organization. OWLL works with formerly incarcerated women in dynamic workshops that that deploy storytelling methods to work through challenging pasts, creating art that is healing for the individual, while building self-esteem and developing skills that will enable successful reentry to society.

She is a Board Member with Families for Justice as Healing, an organization by and for incarcerated and formerly incarcerated women and girls and women with loved ones who are locked up. And she is a member of The National Council for Incarcerated and Formerly Incarcerated Women and Girls and The Association for Addiction Professionals.

Her story and her professional insights echo findings by researchers across the United States about women’s experiences in prisons–and add new impetus to efforts to mitigate the impacts of COVID-19 which is raging inside the country’s prisons, both male and female. Learn more about our research on this topic through our occasional paper, “Forgotten Victims?: Women and COVID-19 Behind Bars.” Learn More Here