Volunteers' Week is an annual national celebration of volunteers and the work they do for society, this year falling between 3 and 9 June. Russell-Cooke associate reflects on her experience conducting singing workshops in UK prisons, and how engaging with volunteering can be enriching, empowering and help shift unconscious biases.
As part of their commitment to charity involvement, Russell-Cooke is piloting a scheme where junior lawyers benefit from a day’s paid volunteering leave in addition to their annual leave.
As an associate in the charity team, I need no persuading of the positive impact that volunteering can have on individuals and communities, and used my day of leave to run a collaborative singing workshop in HMP Bronzefield, with Sing Inside, a charity I co-founded while at university.
Sing Inside conducts collaborative singing workshops into UK prisons by bringing volunteers from the local area into the prison environment to learn music together with incarcerated offenders. Our workshops aim to break down social barriers and foster human connection, to increase confidence, and explore the power of music without judgement. Sing Inside turned 10 years old this month, so the visit to HMP Bronzefield represented a significant anniversary.
The workshop
HMP Bronzefield is Europe’s largest women’s prison. The maximum security private facility in Surrey houses around 575 women and young female offenders.
We passed through security and entered the Visitation Hall to meet the prison residents we’d be working with – a diverse group of around 20 women serving both short and long sentences. We led some breathing exercises, physical warm-ups, and explored songs around the theme of resilient women. Genuine camaraderie developed among the volunteers and prisoners as they supported each other through emotional challenges, and pushed each other to reach higher standards.
Our partners at the Forward Trust, a charity that delivers drug and alcohol addiction management services to prisons, gave us a tour of the prison during lunch. HMP Bronzefield boasts a phenomenal range of facilities – barista and hair and beauty skills training, bicycle mechanics, academic courses – but its capacity for rehabilitation is undermined by persistent staffing issues: prisoners cannot leave their cells to take advantage of what is ostensibly on offer.
After lunch we delivered a performance of the songs we’d worked on to an audience prison residents and staff as part of a prison-wide celebration of International Women’s Day. Jason Moore, a director of the Forward Trust, presented certificates to those who had achieved milestones on their addiction recovery journey – including to many who had joined Sing Inside for the workshop.
For these women, the opportunity to engage in a creative and uplifting activity offered a temporary escape from the bleak monotony of life behind bars. Music has a remarkable ability to transcend barriers and connect people in meaningful ways."
Reflections on the day
As the performances drew to a close, the participants gave feedback about the workshop and presentations. For these women, the opportunity to engage in a creative and uplifting activity offered a temporary escape from the bleak monotony of life behind bars. Music has a remarkable ability to transcend barriers and connect people in meaningful ways: more than just a recreational activity, singing provided the women with a sense of purpose and belonging – qualities too often lacking in the prison environment – and confidence to re-engage with ‘civilians’ on release. One woman told me that their voice felt heard, and that it was nice to be “treated as a person, not a prisoner”.
I always come away from a prison feeling that my in-built biases have shifted. I am still thinking about many of the residents weeks later: about one woman whose court date was scheduled for the week following the workshop; another who was pregnant; another whose mother was also serving a sentence in HMP Bronzefield, part of a generational crime cycle not yet broken.
Lawyers in London offices might easily forget the importance of empathy and understanding in the practice of law, and of the range of institutions that exist within their sector. By stepping outside the daily routine of my role, I gained valuable insights into the lived experiences of individuals who may come into contact with the justice system – and the charities that operate with those individuals in mind.
I’m grateful that Russell-Cooke permitted me to use company time to re-engage with a charity that I love and which does such enriching, humanising work. I feel proud to be part of a firm that is dedicated to supporting initiatives that contribute to positive social change, both inside and outside the office.
By stepping outside the daily routine of my role, I gained valuable insights into the lived experiences of individuals who may come into contact with the justice system – and the charities that operate with those individuals in mind."
Sing Inside is currently recruiting for trustees. To learn more about this opportunity, or about the charity in general, you can visit their website.
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