Seeing the Opportunity
“It was clear to me that existing correctional education programs were woefully
insufficient to compensate for a lifetime of limited opportunity.”
JANE MITCHELL
CEO & CO-FOUNDER
Our Story
While teaching in jails, co-founder and CEO Jane Mitchell saw hundreds of people stuck in a poverty and prison cycle. There were students who first met their parents in prison; children raised expecting to “do time”; and small programs unable to make up for a lifetime of limited opportunity.
Inspired to make a change, Jane spent four years developing a model of an alternative to prison for young adults—integrating best practices in the fields of education, workforce development, and social emotional health, conducting focus groups with people in the justice system, and working alongside top thinkers in the field.
Several years later, Jane met and teamed up with Reset’s co-founder and COO, Jen Anderson, who meanwhile had been pursuing her passion for prison reform since learning the word “recidivism” at age 12. After a serendipitous meeting in New York City and an analysis of the readiness of the field for Reset, the two of them decided to take the Reset model from concept to reality.