ABSTRACT
Women ex-offenders face numerous seemingly insurmountable barriers when attempting to access employment, training and education (ETE) following a prison sentence (see for example Dowling 2001; Hamlyn and Lewis 2000; O'Keeffe 2003). Moreover, for this cohort of women the process of attempting to ‘better themselves’ through ETE, following a criminal conviction, is often experienced as extremely disempowering. This chapter uses the Supporting Others through Volunteer Action (SOVA) ‘Women into Work’ programme 1 to showcase empirical evidence of the successes of ‘peer led’ approaches, to both research and service delivery, in overcoming barriers to ETE for women ex-offenders. 2
