Civic Learning & Engagement at Fort Hays State University is proud to announce the launch of the Co-Creating Community initiative, which supports the successful completion of probation requirements and/or the reintegration of previously incarcerated individuals into our local and regional communities in order to enhance their lives and make communities safer, healthier, and more productive.
This initiative is supported by several community partners, including the Ellis County Attorney’s Office, Community Corrections of Northwest Kansas, the Kansas Recovery Network, is supported by the Campus Community Collaborative (3C), and will provide positive social networking experiences that have curricular and/or co-curricular components to probationers and/or parolees.
This critically important social networking initiative brings people from diverse backgrounds and life experiences together in groups to learn, share, and grow in safe spaces. Respecting the dignity and honoring the individuality of all participants be they parolees, probationers, community members, or FHSU faculty, staff, and students is paramount to this program. Everyone who is a part of the Co-Creating Community initiative, regardless of their status, is encouraged to reimagine the possibilities for their life and how they can leverage their unique and beautiful gifts to positively impact the world around them.
All opportunities offered will support the general outcomes of the program that include but are not limited to leadership development, team building, self-awareness, education, life skills, and personal enrichment.
Goals of this initiative include:
• Create positive social networks.
• Reduce stigma around substance use disorders.
• Reduce stigmatization of people with corrections/justice/law enforcement entanglements.
• Reduce recidivism.
• Help probationers reimagine the possibilities for their lives.
Research supports that social connectedness is related to desirable emotional and behavioral outcomes. Additionally, the US Department of Justice identifies, in Reentry Programs (n.d., p. 3), eight major risk factors that predict reoffending:
• Anti-social, procriminal values and beliefs;
• Pro-criminal associates and isolation from pro-social others;
• Anti-social social patterns;
• History of anti-social behaviors;
• Family criminality and psychological factors;
• Low levels of personal, educational, or vocational achievement;
• Low levels of pro-social leisure involvement; and,
• Substance use disorder.
“Co-Creating Community is absolutely essential in the continued ever-changing landscape of how substance use and recovery is approached, because we MUST develop community solutions. Cross-sector collaboration, partnerships, and the incorporation of people with lived and living experience will help us together to educate one another and therefore encourage us to find adaptive solutions to some of our toughest challenges. I hope this initiative helps empower groups of individuals to lead self-directed and happy lives and who can turn their experience into something that can help communities.”
-Seth Dewey, Co-Founder - Kansas Recovery Network
In addition to our community partners, FHSU is also engaging with campus partners for collaboration and involvement. These include:
The College of Arts Humanities and Social Sciences
The School of Criminal Justice, Leadership, and Sociology
The Dean’s Office
The School of Visual and Performing Arts
The Werth College of Science, Technology, and Mathematics
The Department of Agriculture
The College of Health and Behavioral Sciences
Department of Health and Human Performance
Forsyth Library
Student Engagement/Memorial Union
Global Affairs