overcoming adversity and achieving dreams through higher education
“I’m really excited and nervous to start my new chapter,” Jayda says as she moves into the residence halls before starting classes at UW–Madison. A 2021 Odyssey Junior graduate, Jayda calls it “cool” to have graduated from high school the same year her mother, Shiquita, graduated from the adult Odyssey class. Shiquita proudly describes her …
“Anyone looking at me, I want them to see that no matter what happens — it can be the darkest, deepest pit — you can get out of it,” Odyssey Class of 2004 Anthony Ward says in a 2012 documentary. This summer we celebrate Anthony’s completion of his bachelor’s degree as well as acceptance into …
“What English 100 did for me, I want to do for others. I blossomed in that class. I want others to experience that.” —Dominee Meek, Odyssey Beyond Bars alum (fall 2019) Dominee was in the final years of his nearly 28-year incarceration when he took Professor Kevin Mullen’s English 100 course at Oakhill Correctional in …
“Reading and reflecting on writings at this magnitude has allowed us to respond and be heard, to be a part of the community […] and to be more than just numbers in a system or pictures on our relatives’ wall.” —Randy, student in Afro-American Studies 155 (spring 2021) On a bright afternoon in early May, …
“In finding yourself, you discover an array of beauty within. You discover that you actually are intelligent, when your teachers and classmates had written you off as dumb because you didn’t apply yourself. Now you’ve found that part of yourself you never dreamed of — an appetite for learning. Now you have turned into a …
We wind down the 2020-21 academic year proud of our students and what we have accomplished in the face of adversity. When the pandemic interrupted our face-to-face instruction, Odyssey Beyond Bars (OBB) rose to the occasion, developing new digital teaching tools to engage our students and adding to the courses we offer at Oakhill Correctional Institution. …
Despite battling COVID, deaths of loved ones, homelessness, domestic abuse, parenting stress, lost wages, and physical and mental health challenges, the UW–Madison Odyssey Class of 2021 beat the odds. Thirty-five students graduated in a virtual ceremony on May 5, sharing complex works of literature, philosophy, history, and works of art. As the first graduating class …
“How am I going to die today?” Loche asked herself as she entered UW–Madison’s Hemsley Theatre for Onward Odyssey’s first-ever Acting Techniques class. Professor Baron Kelly notes of Loche and her nine classmates, “The students experienced an unexpected level of risk-taking and empathy and began coming out of their shells.” Fighting shaking hands and a …
Students in the Odyssey Class of 2021 called one classmate their MVP, hero, warrior-scholar and inspiration. Lifelong learner Diane Walton logged on from the hospital to read scenes from A Raisin in the Sun, even with an oxygen tube and beeping monitors. She watched her virtual Odyssey graduation ceremony from hospice care, losing her battle …
When Hezouwe Walada was growing up in rural Togo, West Africa, he craved learning so much that he walked 30 miles daily without shoes, his feet bleeding, to attend the closest village school. Hezouwe brought that persistence with him when he immigrated to America, completed the Odyssey Project and Badger Ready and went on to …