February Share the Plate: The Chillon Project Degree Program at Lee Arrendale State Prison

This February, Northwest is pleased to partner with Life University in Marietta, Georgia in their efforts to provide educational opportunities for incarcerated women.  The program – offered at the Lee Arrendale Women’s Correctional Facility, a maximum security women’s prison in Alto, Georgia (about an hour north of Atlanta) – is one of only a few educational opportunities beyond the GED or vocational education for women in Georgia prisons.  This degree program is the central component of the Chillon Project, an effort of Life University’s Center for Compassion, Integrity, and Secular Ethics to provide higher education to incarcerated people, correctional staff, and returning citizens.


On Monday, January 28, eleven students who are incarcerated at Lee Arrendale State Prison graduated with an Associate of Arts degree in Positive Human Development and Social Change (PHDSC). The students earned an average cumulative GPA of 3.9, and all will go on to pursue a Bachelor of Science in psychology. This was the first class of students in a Georgia state women’s prison to graduate from an accredited college degree program since 1994, when Pell grants were banned for incarcerated persons as part of the Violent Crime Control and Law Enforcement Act.  Another four students who were enrolled in the AA degree program in PHDSC completed their sentences at Arrendale and returned to their communities prior to completing their degrees. One of these students has already begun taking classes at the main campus of LIFE, and completed her first course, General Biology. The rest of the students are expected to follow her soon.

Life University covers the cost of tuition, but all the students returning to their communities and pursuing studies on Life’s main campus will have a number of other needs—books, supplies, wifi, and laptops—for their academic work.  A portion of NWUUC’s donations can help supply these items and ensure that the women are successful in earning bachelor’s degrees and securing employment.

Half of all non-designated funds collected during each of the Sunday services in February will be sent to support the degree program.  If you wish, you may designate all of your donation to the organization by writing “Chillon Project” in the memo line of your check. Please consider donating as generously as you are able.