“Ninety-nine percent of folks incarcerated, had they been presented viable employment opportunities, would have taken a radically different path,” says George Galvis, Executive Director of Communities United for Restorative Youth Justice (CURYJ). At age 17, George was incarcerated after years of childhood exposure to profound domestic violence, drug abuse, racial targeting, and systemic violence. His experiences led to his life commitment as an advocate and organizer for elevating the power of young people most affected by criminalization and violence.
“There’s so much hidden genius and talent behind the walls,” George says. “Our society is not just punishing those who are incarcerated. We’re punishing ourselves, because we don’t know what kind of genius is locked away that might have benefitted us for generations to come.”
In 2019, Galvis was named to New Profit’s second Unlocked Futures cohort. Launched by Tulaine Montgomery in 2017 as a partnership between New Profit and John Legend’s FREEAMERICA with founding support from Bank of America, Unlocked Futures aims to invest in and learn from the genius of social entrepreneurs whose lives have been personally impacted by the American legal system.
“Unlocked Futures is as much about investing in justice-impacted leaders as it is a commitment to turning inward and asking, what would the world be without cages?” says christian perry, Associate Partner at New Profit for Catalyze Investments. “We are committed to investing in innovative and powerful social entrepreneurs who in their leadership and vision disrupt the American legal system’s cycle of invisibilizing and dehumanizing incarcerated people, and bring us closer to a world where our communities are cared for and whole.”
The Unlocked Futures cohort model offers collaborative support to breakthrough social impact leaders and their organizations, creating value across several dimensions. As part of our Catalyze investments approach, this includes $100,000 in unrestricted support, a peer learning community, 1:1 adaptive leadership coaching, consultations with external content experts, and New Profit’s tested capacity-building framework and tools.
The social entrepreneurs in our Unlocked Futures cohorts teach us not only about incarceration and its underlying forces, but the unique ability of proximate individuals to transform systems. “We have so much creativity inside ourselves that we are often diminished due to our past transgressions,” notes Stacey Borden, Founder and Executive Director of New Beginning Reentry Services and member of the latest Unlocked Futures cohort. “We aren’t often taken seriously, we are only seen as being victimizers and fail to recognize that we are victims, too. We must change the way we think from crime and punishment to transforming harm, healing, and giving back!”
“Through our cohorts’ experience,” says New Profit CEO Tulaine Montgomery, “we learn how they’re driving change in their communities, creating opportunities for other formerly incarcerated people, and building coalitions to demand justice and equality—to drive shifts in perspective towards investing in people, not punishment.”
One of those shifts in perspective is simply but powerfully articulated by David Heppard, Executive Director of The Freedom Project and Unlocked Futures alum. “I don’t believe people change,” David says. “I believe they heal.” When we invest in that healing, only then can systems change.