Dr. Byrd-McKinney serves as a Chaplain at Nassau County Correctional Facility
Women are overlooked in the conversation regarding incarceration but the numbers are staggering: incarceration has increased 100x in the past 40 years.
Nassau County Correctional Facility has over 1,000 people currently behind bars, some 700 of them still awaiting trial.
As a chaplain, Dr. Saroya Byrd-McKinney runs the DART program at Nassau Correctional Facility for women who are looking for spiritual, yet practical solutions to their substance abuse issues that serve as part of the narrative of their imprisonment.
Dr. Saroya Byrd-McKinney creates lessons that get to the root of these women’s loss of freedom long before entering prison.
Women in the DART program have seen real change: many are empowered to use this point in their lives to get clean, have a new foundation of faith and hope, and through this program are more mentally prepared for life after prison.
This program serves as a critical way of addressing recidivism while still behind bars by empowering women to take responsibility and giving them the tools to make lasting change.
