Social Change – Branding Appalachia Technical College, Allen Campus

When the coal industry dried up in counties around Appalachia many of the Appalachians were left with no jobs to support their families. The coal industry left its workers with damaged lands and little access to necessities. This generational poverty is ongoing. Today there is new evidence suggesting that redlining is a major cause for people going to prison in Appalachia. This region is also still getting hit hard by the ongoing Opioid Epidemic. We need new solutions to uplift Appalachian communities and give people outlets and opportunities to break this generational curse.
 
Appalachia Technical School’s goal is to provide free education to those getting released from prison in Appalachia. 77% of offenders re-offend within their first five years of being released. We want to lower this number and help provide Appalachians with educational resources that create jobs and uplift their communities. We have locations in counties throughout the region. We work as a network providing educational and counseling resources to our students and their families. We plan to heal our communities by basing our circulant on skills and trades that benefit local economies. Our school requires our students to volunteer their skills to their communities before graduation to gain job experience and reconnect to Appalachian society through positive community building.