Back to School for Women in Transition!

“I remember living next door to Barbara, in an 11 x 15 foot cubicle, in prison, at probably one of the darkest points in both of our lives. As she looked around at all of the women who surrounded her whose lives had been affected by abuse, neglect, poverty and addiction, she developed a passion to make a difference in their lives. She had begun laying the groundwork then for the Women in Transition program.” – Tammy Franklin

Women in Transition is a class of a different kind. It was written by and for women whose life experiences and choices have brought them to a crossroads. Barbara Saunders was incarcerated after many difficult life experiences between 1994-2000. While she was in prison, she said that the Lord dictated the beginnings of the Women in Transition course to her. After her release, as an employee of Stand in the Gap, she wrote and developed the original Women in Transition (WIT) curriculum and developed the program.

She designed the WIT curriculum to be taught behind jail and prison walls so that women would believe they could live clean, sober, safe, and sane in the free world and be equipped to do so. Barbara passionately believed that women of faith and strength could be role models, guides, and encouragers to others.

Tammy Franklin’s experience with the Women in Transition class was personal. She was incarcerated with Barbara Saunders and witnessed the beginning of the class and eventually took it herself (three times!). She also returned to prison as a volunteer to teach the class after she was released.

In 2024, Stand in the Gap’s Women in Transition team worked tirelessly to enhance and update the curriculum. The result is a 21-chapter “book” that addresses the specific issues and life experiences common to incarcerated women.

The typical woman in our classes has experienced one or more of the following things: addiction, abuse, losing custody of her children, traumatic experiences, unresolved anger, childhood interactions with the foster care system, and/or boundary violation (including the absence of personal boundaries).

Her time away from society has offered her the chance to step back from her life, examine it, and choose a different future. That’s where our Women in Transition class comes in.

Our new and improved curriculum addresses each of the issues above (and more), providing our students with knowledge, skills, language, self-work, and support to truly change their lives.

We are so proud of this new and improved curriculum. Building on the foundation of the class that Barbara Saunders created for Women in Transition more than twenty years ago, the new curriculum contains much of the same subject matter but with more depth than ever before. It draws on the expertise of authors like John Cloud and Henry Townsend and Melody Beattie while also offering practical education about practical concerns like obtaining personal documentation, applying for a job, and caring for children.

But, if we are honest, we really don’t believe the curriculum alone is what changes lives (and impacts generations).

It’s all about the teachers.

Every woman who facilitates our Women in Transition curriculum (and worked to revise the curriculum) has previously been incarcerated, which means that each student can see herself in every instructor. Join us in celebrating our great teachers.

Rhonda Bear – Women in Transition Program Director and class facilitator in the Tulsa area

“As I evolved from a scared ex-offender into a woman of “I can” instead of “I can’t”, I often needed assurance from someone who had been in my shoes and succeeded. Barbara was that woman for me. I remember so many times she said “you can”, including the time she asked me to carry the baton of the Women in Transition program.” – Rhonda Bear

At arguably her lowest point, Rhonda spent a freezing night hiding from police in a brush pile.  Her life of running and hiding from her addictions ended there.  She turned herself in and received a ten-year prison sentence.  In prison, she met a Stand in the Gap volunteer, who remains an active part of Rhonda and her children’s lives.

Following her time in prison, a renewed commitment to God and a supportive Stand in the Gap family gave Rhonda the strength she needed to turn completely from her old life. So when she stands in front of a Women in Transition class, she isn’t an outsider doing a good deed.  She is hope.

Kathryn McCollum, former chaplain at Eddie Warrior Correctional Center, says, “When Rhonda comes in, [women] not only get the material about the transition, but also she adds the dimension of ‘You can make it.  I did.’  And that’s very important to the ladies. We can give a lot of words, but when we have someone like Rhonda who walks in integrity and strength and yet compassion, you’ve got the best of all the worlds.  It causes women to open up their hearts and have hope.”

Kathy Peacock – Women in Transition Program Manager and class facilitator in the Oklahoma City area

“The Women in Transition class gives women the opportunity to make a choice to do something different, and shows them resources like transitional housing, sober living, support groups, and spiritual families. I hope my teaching this class shows my kids and grandkids that you can make a choice to change. For me, the only way I could make that choice is Jesus Christ.”

Kathy was 15 when she left her parents’ home and began experimenting with drugs. “First it was marijuana, then prescription speed, and finally methamphetamine.” Kathy describes herself as “rebellious” and feels that leaving home “started my path to prison.”

Although she spent much of her adult life as an addict, Kathy was highly functional in her addiction. She had a farm, where hard work and long hours became an excuse for her addiction to meth, which made her feel more alert and energetic.

Kathy Peacock was in her son’s home, holding her three-year-old daughter, when police in riot gear came to arrest Kathy and the girl’s father. Kathy was incarcerated on a total of five charges and sentenced to 50 years behind bars. She served her time from February 2000 until December 2008.

“God spoke a promise to my heart, that he would deliver me from the situation I was in.”

Deliver he did, but the liberation would take nine years.

Many months after her release, Kathy studied the Women in Transition curriculum with Rhonda’s help. What she learned about communication through Women in Transition helped her to address her son’s disappointment and hurt over her arrest.

Today, Kathy is an active and present participant in her children’s lives. Her daughter-in-law, Cara Alsup, works as Kathy’s assistant. Kathy and Cara are both passionate about seeing families restored.

Shaunte Gordon – Women in Transition class graduate and co-class facilitator in the Tulsa area

“I told Rhonda that I gave my life to the Lord and she said, ‘It’s about time. I’ve been praying for you for a long time.’ God used her in my life in a way that was huge. She had been in my shoes and she kept telling me, ‘You are going to make it.’”

The first time Shaunte went to prison, she was fifteen years old. Two years before that, she gave birth to a child after repeated sexual assaults from her stepfather. Shaunte and her daughter lived together in foster care while Shaunte’s life revolved around three things: her daughter, her anger, and cocaine. The charges that landed Shaunte in juvenile detention and eventually prison were tragic, violent, and true.

Throughout her first twelve years in prison, Shaunte was widely regarded as one of the most difficult, angry, and aggressive prisoners in the Oklahoma women’s system.

One and a half years after her release, Shaunte was in handcuffs, in the back of a police car, riding back to prison. That was the moment that Shaunte relinquished control of her life. “That was the end,” she says. “I said Jesus, save me.”

Shaunte cries while she remembers, “Right away, I experienced peace that passes all understanding. That was the point where this God that I had heard about all my life, the God who parted the Red Sea and sent his son, revealed himself real to me.”

Shaunte’s life has never been the same. Today she is a business owner, a devoted daughter, mother, grandmother, and aunt, and a beacon of hope in every class she teaches.

Through the Women in Transition course and these facilitators, thousands of Oklahoma women have received the education, inspiration, and empowerment they need to live different lives post-incarceration.