A second year in Onward will help Kyle Roberson’s program break down cost barriers and create more connections for more families
For Kyle Roberson, a second year in Onward is more than a funding renewal. It is a vote of confidence from people who believe in the families his work serves, and a chance to say yes to many more.
Roberson’s project, Storytime for Stronger Futures: Building Emergent Readers with Tonies, has been selected again for Texas Tech’s second Onward crowdfunding cohort. Last year’s campaign was a success, and the renewed support arrives as interest in the program grows.
“We really appreciate the help of Onward,” Roberson said. “The crowdfunding was a huge success last year. We’re hoping we can have the same success this year to help continue our efforts.”
Roberson, an assistant professor of Family & Consumer Sciences Education in the Interdisciplinary Human Sciences department, and a retired Federal Bureau of Prisons educational administrator, launched the project with Tonies, the maker of the screen-free Toniebox audio player. Incarcerated parents read picture books aloud and record them onto a Creative Tonie figurine, and their children hear those stories at home.
What a second year makes possible
The goal is to foster more connections. Today, the program runs one cohort of 12 to 15 participants at the Lubbock County Detention Center, a size that fits the facility’s programming room and Roberson’s availability. The program is one part of his faculty workload, making it difficult to get to the facility. Funding can open the door to hiring graduate or undergraduate student assistants, allowing more cohorts to go through the program. If two or three facilities want the program, he plans to rotate among them, spending a few months at each.
More places are part of the plan too. One of Roberson’s local contacts recently transferred to a larger facility in Texarkana, and she remains interested in providing the program for that population. Funding could cover travel for initial staff training and, later, a stipend for a staff member to coordinate it.
Then some costs have nothing to do with interest. At each session, participants record one book and pick two or three more to send home because, Roberson said, the more books in a home, the less likely children are to fall behind in reading. But packages that include a Toniebox and character figures cannot be sent via Media Mail, the lower postal rate for books and educational materials. Hence, mailing is one of the program’s biggest expenses. Some facilities help cover postage. Where they cannot, the program is responsible for it all.
Home internet is another hurdle. Stories must be downloaded onto the device, so a family without Wi-Fi cannot take part. Roberson hopes funding can cover internet for those families while their parent is in the program; once a story is downloaded, the Toniebox keeps playing it without a connection. Breaking down that one barrier would provide education and connections beyond the scheduled program timeline.
“We’re just scratching the surface of what we can do,” Roberson said.
Onward has already laid the foundation, and getting support through the campaign for another year will help build it up even further.
A team that reaches across Texas Tech
Roberson has also built partnerships across campus. The project recently received Institutional Review Board approval to collect data from both incarcerated participants and their families. Catherine Lammert, an early childhood literacy expert in the College of Education, is helping test the benefits for children by comparing their progress over time with a Toniebox at home to typical development. The hope is that the effects last by encouraging children to stay in school and providing them with resources to do so.
The curriculum goes well beyond the book. To help participants put on a show for their kids, Clarence McFerrin, a faculty member in the J.T. & Margaret Talkington College of Visual and Performing Arts, draws on his theater and music expertise to teach intonation, inflection, and expression, so children can hear the story come alive as their parents read. Adding the arts helps make reading stick and builds empathy for a story’s characters.
Benefits that extend inside the walls
The program is built around connection, but the effects reach further. Participants strengthen their own literacy skills, which can encourage them to pursue a GED, trade training, or other education that prepares them for life after release.
The facility benefits, too. Participants in programming are less likely to be involved in incidents, which means less stressful work for officers. At the facility, staying out of trouble is necessary to participate.
“Some of the conditions for them to be a part of our program is to not get in trouble,” says Tammy Smith Russell, Education Coordinator at Lubbock County Detention Center. “They enjoy it so much and have such wonderful comments come back from their families that they work harder to be more successful and not get any disciplinary actions while they’re here.”
And it has a ripple effect. Participants tell their friends and encourage them to work towards qualifying to join. Roberson adds that, over time, more consistent good conduct could even lead to earlier release and faster reunification with families.
That buy-in starts with understanding. Roberson also led empathy training for staff and correctional officers at the detention center to help them understand why the program was coming in.
Director of Programs Captain Salome Lopez described the program’s effect on the officers working in the facility: “It encourages and inspires them to want to be a part of that inmate’s success with their kids.”
Interest beyond Lubbock
Word is spreading beyond Lubbock County. At the Garza Juvenile Facility, where residents can be as old as 21, Roberson has worked with participants who are already young parents and with others who may not have children but have a younger sibling at home. One participant sent the program’s materials to his little brother, who was about 6 years old.
“We didn’t want to tell him, ‘No, you can’t participate,’ when he had somebody that could benefit from it,” Roberson said. “Why not? Help him stay connected to his little brother, maybe be a positive influence.”
However the family is shaped, the aim is the same: connection. The program reaches parents in the county jail, young parents in a juvenile facility, and big brothers separated from younger siblings.
Of course, none of it works without partners, both at the facilities and from Tonies itself.
“I can’t do this without positive community partners that want this kind of programming in their facilities,” Roberson said.
He also noted that the Tonies team has been incredibly generous and supportive from the beginning and as the program grows.
People who deserve support
What Roberson enjoys most is walking through the door, sharing that the excitement when they know they get to participate in the program that day is a great feeling and, for him, that all ties back to a simple belief: the incarcerated parents, young people and families he works with deserve to be supported, and too often they are forgotten.
“I really want to thank you for opening your heart to the population of people that are often forgotten in our society,” he said. “I’m not just talking about the inmates; I’m talking about their families. One of the hard things for people to understand is, even though somebody may have done something wrong and they’re having to spend time away from their family due to incarceration, that child, those family members are doing the same kind of time, just in a different way, separated from their loved one.”