Svarga yoga: Yoga breaks free prisoners from pain with Prison yoga

Prisoners escaping from solitary and experiencing freedom through Prison Yoga

Prison Yoga Project:

Founder : James fox
Started on : 2002
Mission : To help prisoners with Yoga.
Philosophy : Reforming criminal justice system from inside out.
No of Trainers : 2,300 yoga instructors
Place where they teach : https://prisonyoga.org/programs/where-we-teach/
Donate Here : https://prisonyoga.org/donate/
Request free Book here : https://prisonyoga.org/programs/books-for-prisoners/
Staff Details : Bill Brown (Program Director),JC Whitted (Director of Development and Communications),Kaysie Markwardt (Administrative Support, Chapter Director - Sacramento),Kate Beckel (Trainer, Chapter Director -San Diego),Chanda Williams (Trainer, Senior Teacher (San Francisco),Tierney St. John (Trainer, Senior Teacher - San Diego).

Video credits to Gaia

Prison yoga is not a fancy trend like my other previous post,its about a great social reformation program build for prisoner all around the world to experience the practise of yoga.
Prison yoga helps both men and women prisoners to build a better environment using yoga as a medium to transform their life with mindfulness.
According to statistics 1 in 100 adults are in prison,so more number of people are needing support and guidance with some kind of reformation program like the prison yoga project.

Prison yoga project is founded by James fox,who started teaching yoga for prisoner in 2002 at San Quentin Prison.
He has years of experience as facilitator of victim education, violence prevention, and emotional literacy.
He continued to give yoga classes across other prisons in United states and all around the world.
James fox has even taught thousands to become yoga instructors in more than 24 countries.
He is a also a Reviewer for Best Practices for Yoga in the Criminal Justice System and Contributor for Best Practices Yoga by the Yoga Service Council.
He is even an author for the book "Yoga - a Path for Healing and Recovery" free of cost for prisoners.which is published by him in the year 2010.Currently in 2018 about 22,000 copies are shipped.
He is a faculty of Loyola Mary-mount University’s Yoga, Mindfulness, and Social Change Certification Program.
Yoga journal has awarded him in their 40th Anniversary Issue's "Karma Yoga Award".
He is an adviser to the National Institutes of Health-sponsored Chicago Urban Mindfulness Program.

Anyone can their prison yoga project ,even without any prior experience or anything.
But for the volunteering teachers must at least have 200-hour yoga teacher training certification.
According to PYP "there are many opportunities for volunteers not only for teaching,but also more sensitive nature of the work "
They also offers limited scholarships for each training,for scholarships request here : scholarships@prisonyoga.org .

Liberation Prison Yoga is similar to the prison yoga project,actually it was inspired by the idea of james fox's prison yoga.
Liberation Prison Yoga is founded by Anneke Lucas on September 12, 2014.
Prison yoga is inspirational movement like the Yoga amputee movement ,which gives the story of a women started a movement for yoga therapy to fellow amputees.

Anneke Lucas is a book author,public speaker and advocate for child sex trafficking victims.
She herself is survivor of victim of child abuse,that made her to help child abuse victims.
This organisation is similar to that of prison yoga project in many ways ,their mission and philosophy is also to help prisoner community with mindfulness and guidance with yoga therapy.

Prison Phoenix Trust also known as Prison-Ashram Project is founded in the year 1986 by Ann Wetherall,
Ann founded the PPT as organisation to satisfy the spiritual needs of prisoners like meditation and yoga.
The Official first class of Prison Phoenix Trust was done on 1989 at HMYOIs Campsfield House.
Currently the Prison Phoenix Trust gives 140 class per week and 80 branches around united kingdom and Ireland.
Apart from live yoga prison session,they also offer air radio yoga classes 3 times per week.

Honorable Awards obtained by Prison Phoenix Trust are:

According to study published in Forensic Psychiatry shows that yoga has effectively reduced the psychological distress problems in prisoners.
In that research 152 male and female prisoners,in which half of them joined the 90 minutes session for 10 weeks and other half participated weekly classes.
At the end of their classes shows both team shows significant improves mentally less stress,depression and anxiety.
A study on yoga done by Wake Correctional Facility in Raleigh, NC found that inmates who attended more than 4 yoga session classes have effective reduction in re-incarceration rate.