In early January 2018, Yoga 4 Change received a $50,000 grant from the Chartrand Family Foundation to fund an evaluation study to assess the impact of trauma informed yoga on incarcerated individuals. Yoga 4 Change’s curriculum is specifically developed to empower students to break down barriers and confront their emotional and physical limitations, while also providing tools to help students reconstruct their thinking so that they can focus on how to move through their past and start contributing back to their community. As a non-profit organization, Yoga 4 Change is committed to the rigorous examination of their programs with a desire to demonstrate measurable outcomes and facilitate optimal impact with stakeholder funding. The results from this evaluation will be used to:
- Further improve the Yoga 4 Change trauma informed curriculum
- Increase benefits associated with an optimized program
- Expand the audience to whom effective yoga is administered
- Support staff expansion
- Justify changes in the court system to expand Yoga 4 Change program awareness and access
- Validate existing outcome assessments and develop additional tools to demonstrate program impact