Wilder Youth Development & Wayne Halfway House will also partner with Persevere on the program
For many troubled teens, a sentence to juvie feels like a sentence to fail. Statistically speaking — it is. 80-percent of juvenile offenders end up back behind bars within three years, less than 2-percent ever enroll in higher education. Prison is their most likely career path.
Persevere doesn’t believe children should be chained to their past. The social justice organization has created a coding course, so incarcerated youth can engineer a future outside correctional facilities. It’s designed to turn delinquents into developers.
The program’s first beta testers are inside the Davidson County Juvenile Detention Center. Last month, Persevere kicked off its first cohort.
“If correctional facilities aren’t creating opportunity, they’re creating future inmates,” says Persevere founder and CEO Sean Hosman. “We’re excited to partner with DCJD to create opportunities.”
Program
According to Program Manager Audrey Barnes, the elective course will equip incarcerated youth with foundation in front-end development — coding that creates the visuals individuals see on their screens, when using apps and websites.
With these tech skills, teens will be able to apply for internships and apprenticeships with wages upwards of $25/hr upon release.
Persevere will help place them. The national nonprofit has existing relationships with well known tech companies including — Indeed, Slack, Cornbread Hustle, Forbes — through its bootcamp for adult inmates.
Barnes says the course is an elective and does not replace regular academics. It’s structured similar to an after school program.
While incarcerated, participants will receive two hours of in-person instruction two days a week. Basic coding languages — including coffeescript (a precursor to the one of most widely used languages, Javascript) and Python — are introduced through Code Monkey, a popular tech education platform. As individuals excel, more advanced languages like Javascript will be added.
Learning doesn’t end when youth leave the facility. Persevere will provide virtual instruction to teens a year after they are released.
The organization will also work alongside probation officers to ensure youth receive the mental health resources they need to re-adjust and re-enter society successfully.
“We take a holistic approach,” says Barnes. “It’s so much more than just teaching them to code. It’s supporting sustainable futures.”
