Today we’d like to introduce you to Kate Callan.
Thanks for sharing your story with us Kate. So, let’s start at the beginning and we can move on from there.
Back in October of 2012, I was serving as a volunteer chaplain at the Harris County Jail. I was doing church services with the female inmates. One day, I was talking to the head female chaplain, and she said, “All these church services and Bible studies are great. What would really help these ladies though is a class that will teach them how to get a job and live independently when they get out of jail. Well, my background happens to be 25+ years in Human Resources, specifically training and development, so I told her I would put together a class, and that’s how the WINGS Program got its start. We served at the Harris County Jail every Monday night for three years. We then expanded to the Plane State Prison, three Santa Maria Hostel locations (women in residential recovery for drug and alcohol addiction), and most recently the Henley State Jail. We now have 26 volunteers and since we started in 2012, we have helped over 5,000 women.
We’re always bombarded by how great it is to pursue your passion, etc – but we’ve spoken with enough people to know that it’s not always easy. Overall, would you say things have been easy for you?
As with most nonprofits, getting volunteers to serve in the ministry has always been a challenge. Life happens, and it seems whenever we recruit two or three volunteers, we lose one or two, but I have to say we have the most amazing volunteers in the world. These women are so passionate about helping the ladies we serve. They are dedicated, reliable and compassionate. Another ongoing challenge is funding for the ministry. No one likes to fundraise, but the fact of life is that it takes money to do what we do, and we need donors who believe in what we’re doing to support us.
Please tell us about WINGS Ministries – Freedom Through Transformation.
WINGS Ministries – Freedom Through Transformation is about giving women at risk the skills and knowledge they need to get a job and live independently. Most of the women we serve have been incarcerated, are in residential recovery (Santa Maria Hostel) for drug and alcohol addiction, are or have been homeless and are or have been victims of human sex trafficking.
The average rate of recidivism in the US is 68%. That means that within five years, 68% of those getting out of prison will return. What we also know is that inmates that participate in programs like ours have only a 20% recidivism rate. We have been tracking recidivism in one of the Santa Maria programs where we have been serving. Since we began in 2016, we have helped 131 women. Only one of those women has returned to prison in that time.
To be able to help these women change their lives is a privilege and an honor, and since most of them have at least one child, we are also changing their family’s lives. What sets us apart is that we actually go TO the ladies in the prison or in Santa Maria residential recovery locations. Although there are other types of programs, there are no other programs that we know of that teach work/life skills in the prison.
What were you like growing up?
When I was growing up, I wanted to be a teacher. I would line up all my stuffed animals and pretend they were my class. I would lecture them for hours, writing on the chalkboard, reading to them and correcting them when they would get out of line.
Contact Info:
- Address: 8765 Spring Cypress
Suite L-235
Spring, TX 77379 - Website: wingstofreedom.net
- Phone: 2814150750
- Email: katecallan.wings@gmail.com
- Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/wingstofreedom/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/wings_houston?lang=en
Image Credit:
Pic 1 Kathy Wortham, Kate Callan (center) and Irma Barbee; Pic 2 Kate teaching a WINGS class at Santa Maria Hostel
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