My name is Ariadni Brempou, and I’m a junior in high school.
For many years now, I’ve had a big passion for the law and psychology. Fortunately, this passion has been fed in multiple ways. For instance, I attended Liberation Summer Camp during the summer of 10th grade. Getting inspired by the people I met there, I wanted to continue my exploration of incarceration and developmental psychology. The first way I did so was by expanding a research paper I wrote and published on the perceptions vs reality of reasons for incarceration.
I realized a leading cause for youth incarceration is violence. To become more educated on this topic, I attended an alternatives to violence workshop called AVP. During this workshop, we discussed abstract concepts like love and violence. After identifying what violence entails, we focused on ways to deescalate conflict before it occurs. The importance of this program is that it’s not only open to the community, but also available in some prisons. Hearing about its already successful impact, I plan to become a facilitator of AVP for incarcerated individuals.
Continuing this exploration of violence related to incarceration (particularly regarding youth), I’m part of a volunteer program where I get to meet and defend people my own age. They were all nearly incarcerated, but had the opportunity to attend this program instead. It’s been a really rewarding experience, especially since I get to see the people I help make an attempt to better their lives.
However, the more of these experiences I have the more I realize that there are endless disparities stemming from incarceration. Thus, taking what I’ve learned, I decided to attend to these disparities by creating a podcast: Elpida.
The goal of this podcast is not only to spread awareness about incarceration, but to soften the image surrounding criminalized people. It’s also meant to encourage those incarcerated to remain hopeful (hence elpida, the Greek word for hope). To achieve this, I invite people who have either had first hand experience with incarceration and/or are part of the effort to reform the criminal legal system. For example, my first episode featured [AFSC Youth Empowerment & Engagement Coordinator] Akira Rose who gave a brief introduction to incarceration. She used her experiences with various programs and research she’s done to discuss policing and violence.
My most recent episode was centered around Woman’s reentry into society following incarceration. [AFSC New Hampshire's Healing Justice Program Associate] Ophelia Burnett, the podcast guest, not only used her personal experience with incarceration to create a women's reentry program but passed legislation surrounding women's rights in prisons (i.e. making it so women don’t have to pay for tampons/pads in prison).
Future episodes will include people like: a police officer in the Bronx, the head of the Center of Justice Program at Columbia University, and another woman who has experienced first hand incarceration.
I’m incredibly grateful to have participated in so much, and I’m very eager to continue my efforts to produce change.
Learn more about NY Healing Justice and sign up for updates.