Guest blog post: Introducing Ben Ford

It’s January 2014, and I’m sat on a sheep’s skin, crouched between two rocks on the high moor. I have been given a question from Caspar Walsh: ‘Why am I here?’

This scene was one of my first encounters with Write To Freedom, on a mentor training weekend.

My name’s Ben, and since that weekend, I’ve become one of the key forces within the charity.  I’ve mentored, facilitated, support staffed, and now I’m coordinating a project for imprisoned fathers and their families alongside Parc Prison and Barnados.

To tell you a little bit about myself and how I came to be a part of Write To Freedom, I grew up in the wildly awesome Cornwall where welly walks, roaring coastlines and blistering summers by the sea were the norm.  My childhood and teenage years were filled with all of the good things you would expect. But underlying this, I also had to contend with an absent father, and a succession of drug dealers and alcoholic men being my day-to-day role models.

A lot of young men have had similar, sometimes much worse, experiences than me. Some are not so fortunate to find a way out of the cycles and habits they have learnt from their role models growing up. These sorts of undeserved experiences force young people into drugs and crime. Luckily for me, at some point along the way I channeled that anger and fear away from crime and drugs, and plowed it into my academic life. I began a journey of personal development, which led me to Write To Freedom.

This year is an exciting year for myself, and for Write To Freedom. After a period of infrastructure growth we are turning our sites back to delivery, and I’m very glad to be involved. There is nothing more rewarding than taking young people on a journey out on the moors, away from their iPhones, and into a more instinctual reality where they are emotionally challenged, yet safe and held. And once more, I too am continually challenged and pushed out of my comfort zone working alongside Write To Freedom. As we continue to help others, we also continue to help ourselves. It’s that synergy which is so great about the work we do.

In answer to Caspar’s question ‘Why I am here’, in my time of need as a teenager, I came very close to straying down bad paths. If it weren’t for a couple of influential role models in my life, I would be in a very different scenario today. I am here because I want to make sure that Write To Freedom comes into the lives of others just at the right time, as it did for me, and that everyone has the opportunity to surround themselves with nature, growth, and solid role models.

I’m more than happy to talk in further detail about my experiences, both with Write To Freedom and growing up. Drop me an email on benf909@hotmail.com

Floorboards, Stories and Trust

Tribe Warrior Into the Wild, wilderness and writing project is going strong up on Dartmoor with three young people fully committed to the work. All are saying they are getting lots from the story, the nature connection, the activities and our time together round the fire. J has been so immersed in reading Tribe Warrior between sessions that her mother actually hid the book from her because she was so unsettled by how unusually quiet J had been and thought she may be making trouble! J eventually found it under some floorboards!

J brought in this letter at the beginning of our session last week:

“Dear Caspar

Your story really touched me because I too know what it is like to be so addicted to drugs and feel there is no way to stop. I’ve been clean for 6 months until I relapsed, all the work I had put into changing my life went down the drain. I’m so glad I have joined Write to Freedom! It’s giving me the chance to clear my head and to really think over my problems and ways to sort them out. Your definitely someone I will look up to now, it’s just the fact that I was going down the wrong road and you have given me words of strength and wisdom I now feel like I can have the strength to say no to my bad habits and stop tostart a fresh new me. So thank you so much for what you have done.

 Your friend J” 

At the last closing circle we all said what we had got from the day. AJ had the final words:

“I learnt to trust here I never learnt to trust before. I never trusted people before until I came here.”

Very humbled by these words and very happy he is getting something so important at this challenging time in his life.

Caspar.

New Leaves. Ancient Stories. Changing Lives

Welcome to the first blog, for our newly launched website from Write to Freedom founder and Creative Director Caspar Walsh

Dicken’s fictional ‘Hard Times’ are here, now, in real time. The impact of the global financial crisis of 2008 has hit pretty much everyone I know in one way or another. I won’t get into the politics (I’d only get into trouble), only to say that as a result of government cuts, the crucible of Write to Freedom’s creation, the highly progressive HMP and YOI Ashfield, was shut down in 2013. This ended an era of work for us. Some of the many amazing projects we ran there over a ten year stint included the much praised BBC Radio 4 docu drama, written and recorded in the prison and a long standing column in The Guardian. Ultimately it became a place where we helped young prisoners break free and come work with us in the wilds of Dartmoor – if only for a weekend on licence for good behaviour. Over the final five years at Ashfield we ran more than twenty residential programmes on moor and coast and countless workshops inside the prison. Saying goodbye to that level of engagement, energy, personal transformation and the amazing prison education staff was tough for all of us.

Since Ashfield ended, Write to Freedom (W2F) has been finding its creative feet in a time of radical government reform. Continuing our strong portfolio of prison work, we’ve also commenced a series of community based projects with probation, youth offending and addiction support services. Moving forward with our partnership with HMP and YOI Parc, and now working alongside Barnardo’s, we have launched the New Leaves programme; supporting children and their imprisoned parents in a series of nature-connection and story creation days on the Brecon Beacons. This has been generously funded by The Worshipful Company of Weavers.

We’re also furthering our long term focus and experience in mentoring young people with an Awards for All funded wilderness and writing project for young people from Plymouth. This will include a series of outdoor days, working with Tribe Warrior, time on Dartmoor and personal, explorative writing.

We’ve spent the last two years developing these and other projects as well as building the infrastructure, strategy and profile of the charity. In much the same way our students have had to adapt to survive and thrive in life, so too has W2F.

This newly launched website, which I think is a big achievement, reflects this new phase of our work and growth and celebrates our many new developments and achievements. We’ve built on a strong track record for top notch creativity and delivery and worked hard to create new opportunities for a wider, even more diverse client group.

Personally it has been a tough few years, both in the new directions with my professional writing and teaching and in finding my place in this newly expanded and thriving organisation. My vision for W2F has always been as a vehicle for personal change and growth, for creativity and communication and for this to be for everyone involved: students, staff, volunteers partner organisations and funders. What is happening now shines a light on all that and makes the long road extremely worthwhile. I’m humbled by it all.

I’ll be blogging regularly for this site, including new material from our students and staff, comment on social and criminal justice issues, and reporting back on all that is happening with Write to Freedom and our writing in the wild.

In closing and honouring the motto of the recently departed guiding light of 70’s televisual justice… Police 5’s, Shaw Taylor: “Keep ‘em peeled…”

Caspar Walsh

Creative Director

March 2015

New Leaves project with HMP Parc secures funding

We had some very exciting news this week, the Benevolent Company of Weavers announced £15k of funding towards our New Leaves project. We will be bringing Write to Freedom’s unique fusion of nature-based activities, creative writing and personal development to imprisoned fathers at HMP Parc and their families.

This innovative project will focus on strengthening family relationships and providing opportunities for meaningful, positive and memorable whole family activities.  HMP Parc prison is nationally renowned for its Family Interventions Unit; which recognises the importance of strengthening family relationships in reducing reoffending, improving outcomes for children of prisoners and breaking intergenerational cycles of offending.

The New Leaves project will be delivered in partnership with HMP Parc and Barnardo’s, who have worked closely with Parc on their flagship Invisible Walls Wales programme.  Barnardo’s many years of expertise will inform our delivery around engaging with families and creating a lasting and meaningful impact for the children of prisoners involved in this project.  You can read about Barnardo’s Children of Prisoners campaign here.