Project Summary
Grantee	: Youth Re-Autonomy Foundation of Turkey
Purpose	: Establishing women-centered support services at women prisons
Location	: Adana, Ankara, Denizli, Eskisehir, Istanbul
Grant Amount	: 130.598 TL
Project Partner	: Dogus University, Civil Society Association on Prisons and Imprisonment
Period	: 15 April 2011-15 April 2012
Status	: Completed
Project Year	: 2011

Background

The General Directorate of Prisons in Turkey highlights that there are 4337 incarcerated women as of 2011. As of 2010 the Turkish Department of Justice estimates that 444 incarcerated women live in prisons with their 470 kids aged 0-6. (Youth Re-Autonomy Foundation of Turkey, 2011)

Project Goals

• At Istanbul, Adana, Ankara, Denizli and Eskisehir Woman Prisons:
  • 55 women and girls will participate in “Motherhood Skills“, “Health" and "Woman Rights” trainings.
  • Seminars on gender will be held for 1200 incarcerated women.
  • 415 prison personnel will be trained on"woman and child rights".
• The model will be shared with the Turkish Department of Justice to scale up the woman and child-centered woman prison model.

Project Results

• Field visits to the project provinces were completed and local project coordinators were identified.
• 8 role model women in high level management positions were selected.
• Training content for young girls was developed.
• Seminars on gender awareness for 15 dorm administrators and educators were conducted.
• 311 young girls participated in training sessions on gender.
• Women who were identified as role models met high school girls and 93% of the participants reported that they would like to have a career in the future.
• 254 young girls completed trainings on team-work, communication and project development.
• 78 young girls planned and implemented 12 social responsibility projects.
• A book discussing challenges of girls in dorms and sharing the experiences of the project “Girls Living in the Dorm: Count me In”, was published and shared with stakeholders.

Testimonials

“This project is particularly important to realize the problems of imprisoned women. In all the activities implemented for them there was one common theme: women thought of themselves as victims in the process of imprisonment. Therefore, all the project activities that bring upon this victimization are valuable.”

Trainer

“This workshop for imprisoned women has been very instructive for me. Teaching gender and human rights to a group in an environment that I am not familiar has been a transformative experience for me.”

Trainer

“The Kasimpasa group [Referring to some of the imprisoned women that attended seminars] changed a lot. Sometimes I hear them talking about you [Referring to the Youth Re-Autonomy Foundation of Turkey]”

Prison Personnel

“Girls were very tempered and polarized. The trainings were very useful for them in that sense and after the trainings they did not argue as much. I wish there were more projects like this that would help girls spend more valuable time. When they have nothing to do, they just start being hard on one another. “

Prison Personnel

“We used to work with young girls in similar ways, yet with this project we realized that it is important to focus more on women rights. In fact, most of the young girls in prisons are actually imprisoned as they are completely unaware of their rights”

Prison Personnel