Lauren Reed

Lauren graduated from Rutgers University in 2017, making her the first person in her family to earn a bachelor's degree. She is also an alumna of the New Jersey Scholarship and Transformative Education in Prisons Consortium (NJ-STEP) and the Rutgers Mountainview Community of New Brunswick, a pathway from the prison campus to Rutgers University. Lauren served as the co-chair for the 2019 National Conference for Higher Education in Prison (NCHEP) planning committee before joining the Alliance for Higher Education in Prison team. She currently serves on the Executive Board for NJ F.O.R.T.E. House and advisory board for Princeton University’s Prison Teaching Initiative (PTI). Lauren was a member of the first cohort of Faces of Women Imprisoned and a member of the 2020 cohort of Columbia University’s Women Transcending Collective Leadership Institute. She regularly speaks about her journey with higher education in prison, telling her story of becoming a professional in the field of higher education in prison after incarceration and sharing the impact of this work on herself and the community. Her focus has been in communications and community engagement, working towards sharing resources with the higher education in prison community and bringing awareness to the public. She is passionate about empowering, educating and supporting people affected by incarceration.