Sharon White-Harrigan: Artist, Sister, Trailblazer
Sharon White-Harrigan, one of CCF’s earliest graduates, loved education since she was a child. Raised by a father with five degrees, including a law degree, medical degree, and Ph.D. in Theology, Sharon excelled in school and always imagined that she would earn her college degree right after high school. But at 16, Sharon found herself pregnant and lost focus on school while she raised her daughter.” And at 24, Sharon found herself in prison for defending herself against sexual assault. Sharon recalls,
“In prison I was so angry and felt like the whole situation was so surreal. But eventually I thought to myself ‘You have 9-18 years. You can do this time, or you can let this time do you.’”
That’s when Sharon decided to enroll in the college program at Bedford Hills Correctional Facility. But unfortunately for Sharon, she soon found that the program was closing. Because of the Pell grant repeal in 1994 and subsequent TAP grant repeal in 1995, there would be no more college programs at Bedford Hills.
“I tried to find ways to keep my mind going,” Sharon remembers. “I took some GED courses and passed the GED. I just kept thinking, ‘They’ve got my body, but they can’t take my mind.’”
While Sharon kept busy with whatever academic programs were available, she became part of an historic effort to bring college back to Bedford Hills. Led by CCF alumna Cheryl Wilkins (who was incarcerated at the same time) and correctional superintendent Elaine Lord, the project brought a private college program run by Marymount Manhattan to Bedford Hills. When Sharon enrolled in the program, she met CCF founder Barbara Martinsons.
“Barbara was my professor at Bedford Hills. When I sat in the classroom and we started working, it was like a door opened up to a whole other world. Being able to develop and nurture [my] mind, became everything to me. I remembered the feeling of being a young girl and loving school. Barbara treated us as if we were students on the outside. She didn’t let up or give us a break, she was genuine in her teaching and her concern, and she was dedicated to making us effective in our learning. I earned my Associate’s in prison, and then I heard about CCF.”
When Sharon was released from prison in 2004, CCF became a central point of her life. With our support, Sharon earned both her Bachelor’s and Master’s degree in Social Work. She held leadership roles running programs at Exodus Transitional Community and Housing + Solutions. During this time, she also joined the Theater for Social Change Ensemble, which she says “gave me a sense of belonging in a whole different way. We shared amongst each other and came up with innovative ways of expressing ourselves. It was art therapy.”
Throughout this time, Sharon never stopped advocating for her sisters, working on the Correctional Association’s Women in Prison Project, and helping lead the campaign to pass the Domestic Violence Survivor’s Justice Act. Her strong background in both advocacy and social work eventually led her to her current role as Executive Director of the Beyond Rosie’s campaign, making sure that women who had previously been incarcerated on Rikers Island have access to adequate resources.
“We all envision a world without prisons and jails, but if we’re not ready for it yet, we need to make sure we have a trauma-informed center with trained professionals. Women with lived experience are the experts on their own lives, so they should be the ones to say how this should go and say what their needs are. We want to have our finger on the pulse of the whole project from program design to operations.”
Sharon says that her experience with CCF prepared her for her work with Beyond Rosie’s: “CCF taught me camaraderie.We [students] cared for one another, we gave each other resources, and that instilled those qualities inside of us. We wanted to hold onto that momentum and the philosophy of ‘Each one reach one, each one teach one.’” Today, she works with CCF alumnae and students in the campaign. Alumnae Cheryl Wilkins, Yolanda Johnson-Peterkin, and Kandra Clark (who run their own CJ-focused programs at Columbia University, NYCHA, and Exodus Transitional Community, respectively) are on her Board, and many Beyond Rosie’s advocates are current CCF students or graduates of the WISH Advocacy Training Program.
What does Sharon hope for the future of her advocacy work?
“It’s bittersweet doing this work. We shouldn’t have to advocate for human decency. Why do we have to be superwomen? Why can’t we just be women?” she asks. “I hope our work can make it so that we don’t have to fight anymore.”
And to current CCF students, Sharon has one piece of advice: