When I walked out of prison after 18 years, I carried more than just the weight of a second chance. I brought with me the tools I spent years building. A bachelor’s degree, experience leading trauma-informed groups, and the raw determination to give back to a society I once harmed. But good intentions don’t pay rent. And meaningful work, the kind that makes healing possible for yourself and others, is hard to find for someone with a record and little to no experience living in the society that once kept him locked up.
That’s why AmeriCorps matters.
In March 2025, I was accepted as a member of the California Justice Leaders, a partnership between AmeriCorps and the nonprofit Impact Justice aimed at supporting formerly incarcerated adults. This program has been instrumental in my professional development and in fulfilling my dream of helping others. I was placed as an intern at The Prism Way, a Los Angeles-based nonprofit focused on the holistic aspect of reentry and healing, supporting adults and youth in detention centers. It was a launching pad where my brothers and sisters taught me valuable work habits and supported me through my reentry.
This internship has allowed me to serve as a mentor, a community educator, and a support system for others coming home. I’ve earned certifications in anger management facilitation and as a Medi-Cal peer support specialist. It’s given me the foundation to build on the education I earned while incarcerated. This was a way to apply the years of experience I had facilitating groups inside in a professional setting.
I almost lost this opportunity. At the end of April, the federal government abruptly eliminated 32,000 AmeriCorps positions nationwide and shuttered over 1,000 programs. The cuts came without warning. I heard the news early in the morning when I got an email with the subject line “Emergency Zoom Meeting.”
The cuts threatened not just individual positions like mine, but the entire infrastructure of grassroots organizations that depend on AmeriCorps volunteers.
The Prism Way is a small organization and it would not have been able to hire myself and the other two interns placed there through California Justice Leaders. We helped the organization expand its programs beyond the reentry space to offer more programming inside prisons, juvenile detention centers, as well as inside the community. They would not have the staff to do any of this without us.
California Justice Leaders also places formerly incarcerated people at organizations such as Project Rebound, a program in the California State University system that supports formerly incarcerated students. At CSU San Bernardino, two Justice Leaders work as reentry navigators, helping other formerly incarcerated students and youth navigate higher education.
The AmeriCorps cuts hit formerly incarcerated volunteers particularly hard. Unlike traditional college-aged AmeriCorps volunteers, these are adult students with families and financial responsibilities. When the cuts were first announced, the navigators immediately began applying for other jobs. “They don’t have the luxury of waiting around,” said Michael Griggs, Project Rebound coordinator at CSU San Bernardino.
It feels scary.
I believed that federal funding was stable, and based on that assumption, I made some big decisions for myself. I rented an apartment and bought a new car. In prison, I was used to good things being taken away, and when this happened, I thought to myself, “Here it goes again.” I was left to figure out if graduate school was a realistic option for me after the joy of being accepted to my MBA program at Cal State Los Angeles. The tuition, the books, and even the time that I would invest were all things I had to figure out for myself. I chose to continue with my educational pursuit and hold on, hoping that Impact Justice, the organization overseeing California Justice Leaders, would figure it out and that I would be alright.
We got a reprieve after the initial announcement because Impact Justice was able to secure alternative funding that allowed current California Justice Leaders to continue their positions. Other organizations were also able to find ways they could keep their Americorps volunteers on staff. At CSU San Bernardino, for example, Project Rebound was able to hire their two Justice Leaders as student assistants, but only because of their student status, Griggs said. Many grassroots organizations don’t have these options.
At the beginning of June, a federal judge granted a temporary block on AmeriCorps funding cuts, but only for the 24 states that sued the administration. More recently, a second federal judge ordered the Trump administration to reinstate some AmeriCorps workers who were laid off without notice.
But even programs that had their current funding restored still face an uncertain future as the federal infrastructure that supports them is being dismantled. The government has laid off over 500 full-time federal Americorps staff who administer the program, and the court cases only applied to the states or organizations that sued. It’s also unclear whether the government will continue to fund the program going forward.
“As a person who learned how to be an adult in prison, this job training and work experience I gained through Americorps were a huge part of my growth as a person transitioning back into society.”
Kun Lyna “K” Tauch
As a person who learned how to be an adult in prison, this job training and work experience were a huge part of my growth as a person transitioning back into society. The California Justice Leaders program helped me build skills, assisted me in navigating reentry, gave me access to resources and then, and is now teaching me how to do it for others. They gave me a hand up and a way to make a living doing the very thing that I had always wanted to do. Make amends and serve others.
I am part of a program that places formerly incarcerated programs into paid service roles, helping other justice-impacted people navigate parole, housing, job searches, and education. And as if that wasn’t enough, they pay a living wage. It’s not just professional development—it’s public safety, trauma healing, community restoration, and building communities.
Programs like this are easy targets in a political climate that treats incarceration as a line item rather than a human experience.
Because of my experience as California Justice Leader at The Prism Way, I have seen that hope, healing, and restoration aren’t just words; they’re outcomes. But they only happen when people are invested. AmeriCorps gives grassroots organizations the flexibility to invest in us.
The truth is, when you’ve spent 18 years learning to be an adult in prison, programs like California Justice Leaders aren’t just jobs — they’re bridges back to society. They’re proof that our experience has value, that our pain can become our purpose.
For now, I’m going to be able to finish out my year of service and move on to the next step: starting my MBA at Cal State LA this fall. But for other formerly incarcerated people, the future of this program remains uncertain.