Kamini Ramakrishna

Children of Incarcerated Caregivers (CIC) is a nonprofit organization whose mission is to promote the best interest of the child when their parents are imprisoned. This is done through researching and disseminating information to legal professionals and policy makers in order to support the creation of laws and policies that promote the child’s best interest. In addition to research, CIC also offers resources and programs for families who are affected by incarceration.

I worked on a variety of projects at CIC as a Legal Research Intern. I was part of the team working on the Prison Nursery Project, which is done in collaboration with the Human Rights Program at the University of Minnesota. The Prison Nursery Project’s goal is to examine the risks, benefits, and alternatives to children living in prison nurseries due to a parent’s incarceration. Part of how CIC conducts this work is through a podcast series called the Prison Nursery Podcast.

As a member of the Prison Nursery Podcast team, I took it upon myself to find a fifth guest for the series. I eventually connected with an organization in Kenya that works with incarcerated mothers and children to help them reintegrate into society as well as works to safeguard their well-being while in prison. They were interested in being a guest on the podcast and we scheduled a date to record the episode!

My other important task as a member of the Prison Nursery Project team was to conduct research into the countries of Kenya and New Zealand and to begin to draft a country report about how each country’s criminal justice system treats incarcerated mothers and their children. These reports, once finalized, are eventually to be shared with legal professionals and policy makers (and possibly even the general public) as a way to explore the benefits and shortcomings of prison nurseries by looking at how they function in different countries throughout the world.

In addition, I and the rest of the Prison Nursery Project intern team engaged in the early stages of brainstorming for a meeting/conference with other US-based organizations, with the goal of examining how the best interests of children of incarcerated parents can be respected and fulfilled by US federal and state authorities.

I greatly enjoyed working at CIC this summer and gaining more insight into how the criminal justice system functions in multiple countries, and more specifically how women and children are treated within it. I look forward to maintaining the connections I made and possibly working at CIC again sometime in the future!