Nacho was just five months out of prison – after serving time for murder – when he joined the class. Genea was living with her mom in a studio apartment that was the size of her prison cell. Tin, also convicted of murder and now an undocumented refugee, carpooled to campus with Sonny’s family, who have been trying to prove his innocence for more than two decades. Sam and Quinnie, like the others, were juveniles when they were sent to prison.

No matter their backgrounds, they found their way to my classroom to collaboratively tell their stories using immersive technologies alongside my JOVRNALISM™ students. This is not a traditional journalism project where we parachute into a community to gather and decide the stories… instead we partnered with a non-profit, Words Uncaged, to train and empower the community participants to define and tell their own stories on their own terms using 360/VR cameras – all while we were still dealing with COVID.