About Alpha For Prisons

How is Alpha delivered in prisons?

Outside the prison fence

The Alpha course is delivered to inmates by trained Alpha volunteers with endorsements of their congregational leadership and who have participated in the course themselves. The office of the National Director for Alpha for Prisons & Re-Entry will coordinate the establishment of the course with the Warden/Chaplain and coordinate day-to-day operations with the Warden’s appointee.

Scheduling is flexible considering the prisons daily schedule of operations and the availability of volunteers. A 2-hour introduction program precedes the course, which is open to all inmates. The introduction consists of video presentations explaining the course, music and refreshments. From this introduction inmates will make application to attend. Generally no more than 40 inmates may participate at a time. Refreshments are served at each course.

During Week 7 of the course Alpha presents a “Holy Spirit Day”. It is imperative that this event be held but there are several formats in which it can take place. Generally speaking a full day is needed and a meal with the volunteers is served. Flexibility however will be the considered in setting this time apart from the normal routine of the facility. Typically once the course has been completed another one will commence. The course must be taught once per week for 11 weeks in 2-hour sessions following the established Alpha “receipt” which consist of the following weekly subjects:

1. Who is Jesus?
2. Why Did Jesus Die?
3. How Can I Be Sure of My Faith?
4. Why and How should I Read the Bible?
5. Why and How Do I Pray?
6. How Does God Guide Us?
7. Holy Spirit Day
• Who is the Holy Spirit?
• What Does the Holy Spirit Do?
• How Can I be filled with the Holy Spirit?
8. How Can I Resist Evil?
9. Why and How Should We Tell Others?
10. Does God Heal Today?
11. What About the Church?
12. How Can I Make the Most of the Rest of My Life?

What are the costs?

There is no cost of the course to the facility. Cost of materials for one offender is approximately $8.00.

The Alpha Re-Entry Model:

Alpha USA through collaboration with other faith based and community organizations offer re-entry services to the criminal justice system. Based upon proven faith based models of re-entry, which have demonstrated a dramatic reduction in recidivism rates for participating inmates, the program is provided by volunteers and locally coordinated. Generally speaking each prison warden would attest to the fact that there are more Faithbased volunteers requesting access to their prison than they have time or space to accommodate. Should they be candid, they would divulge that in terms of recidivism of offenders many of these programs do very little. The programs are not strategically coordinated to work together nor for that matter with the goals of the prison. The primary criticism however is that few to none of the programs have a re-entry component to assist offenders once they are released.

Picture if you will the varied Faithbased programs that inmates may attend in a given week. Each evening they may be taught the exact opposite of what they heard the evening before. Is their addiction a result of a disease, psychological issues, or sin? The inmates may leave the program having gained some insight into their problems only to return to their living unit where they must guard themselves and their feelings. Consequently they complete their time in prison never dealing with the issues at hand, nothing has changed and return to the same environment they left with no new skills to assist them as they transition back into the community. No wonder the national recidivism rate is approximately 70%!

The Faithbased Re-Entry Initiative, as the model is called, will consist of a separate living unit on which the inmates who volunteer for the program will live. The living unit will become a “safe” community in which they may reacquaint themselves with who they truly are and begin to “practice” how to live a socially acceptable life while still in confinement. Volunteers and staff may then provide a strategic intervention when necessary, as they are working together and focused upon a manageable number of program participants.

90% of the inmates in the program have 2 years before release eligibility. 10% are serving longer sentences. During the recruitment event held at the prison inmates are be informed that this is a Christian Faithbased re-entry program and that to be eligible they must volunteer to participate in all of the offered curriculum. They do not have to be Christian to volunteer nor do they have to have a conversion experience to participate in re-entry services upon release.

It should be noted that there is also a component of the program in which families of the inmates will be asked to participate. Participation by the families is not mandatory but preferred. These components may be in-prison participation in curriculum with the inmates, church support prior to the inmates release and/or post-release referral services.

Please contact the National Director, Alpha for Prisons & Re-Entry for more information.

(918) 231-8847 / (940) 692-1694 fax / Email Jack Cowley