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We encourage you to read these prompts and write a post about your own personal experience. This way, the posts that you share will be with utmost sincerity which will likely resonate with far more people.

Here are the prompts that our Amplify Austin chair, Emilie has come up with:

WSP – Personal Experience Prompts

• What moves you?

• What was your educational experience like? (teacher or student)

• What was your relationship with your mother, or a mother-like figure/guardian, like?

• What is your favorite memory of your mother? What is your favorite memory of your child/children?

• As a child, what was soothing for you? What did you go back to for comfort and/or stability?

• Do you have a specific memory of your mother reading to you as a child?

• Did you you have a favorite book that your mother read to you?

• How did you learn to read?

• Is there a specific children’s book that really resonates with you? What is it and how did it impact your life as a child? Did it make you see things differently?

  • Example: My mom read me a book called “Lunch Box Surprise” nearly every night when I was in Kindergarten and I had the entire book memorized. Not only did this book teach me how to read in context but I also learned a valuable life lesson about how a small gesture of kindness goes a very long way. M.M.

• Have you or someone you are close to had an experience with the criminal justice system that has changed you in some way? How did it change you?

• Do you know someone who has been to prison? Did you witness the relationship between them and their family suffer due to this absence?

• What is your favorite sound?

  • Example: My favorite sound is my mother’s voice. My mother has been an avid singer my whole life and I feel a special connection to her when I hear her sing and speak. I even wrote my application essay to St. Edward’s about this and then ended up working with the Women’s Storybook Project soon after starting school. Coincidence? I think not.

• Who’s voice do you wish you could hear again?

• If you had the chance, what one relationship would you choose to mend?

• What volunteering opportunities speak to you?

• Can you think of a particular situation where you longed for a familiar sound (someone’s voice, a laugh, a song, a sound in nature, or otherwise) that would have or did bring you comfort? Perhaps you were travelling, you had moved to a new place, someone you loved had passed away or was imprisoned. Any scenario is meaningful and applies.

 WSP Founder, Judith Dullnig, orients interim Executive Director, Bergan Casey. Bergan has consulted with WSP on branding and development projects and understands the importance of promoting literacy and connecting families. She and Judith are planning a very busy first quarter. Be on the lookout for additional news coming soon.

If you’re interested in learning more about volunteering in the prisons, click here!