Katie Turner, the Program Director for Poetic Justice California, holds a Bachelor’s Degree in Literature and Political Science from the University of Vermont, a Master’s Degree in Arts-in-Education from the Gallatin School of Individualized Study at New York University, and a Secondary English Teaching Credential in 6-12th grade English from the University of San Diego’s School of Leadership and Education Sciences.
Katie has taught rehabilitative arts programming in juvenile facilities, jails, and women’s prisons for a combined 10 years. In 2019, after 12 years teaching creative writing and AP Literature on the high school level, Katie started the California chapter of Poetic Justice.
What began with 15 women and gender diverse folks in one jail in Santee California, has grown to 100s of people a year in jails, reentry facilities, psychiatric stabilization units, juvenile centers, rehabilitation facilities, and both of California’s state prisons for women.
Katie has the privilege of facilitating trauma-informed poetry classes, collaborating with an incarcerated advisory board of 11 poets and leaders at the California Institution for Women, and supporting a staff of teaching artists
We are still so locked away. / The words get locked away too. / And this is what poetry can do. / It can give me back to you.