Jia Johnson, Fall 2019

Jia Johnson was in her last year of her Master of Arts in Public Ministry (MAPM) at Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary when Dr. Jenny McBride, PhD invited her to co-teach the second pilot certificate course offered at the Cook County Department of Correction. Shortly after Johnson was hired as the Project Director for Certificate in Theological Studies. Simultaneously, the Certificate program became the ministry site for her MAPM public ministry capstone project entitled “A Model of Institutional Leadership as Servants of Solidarity: Liberative Theological Education in Jail”. Upon graduation in 2020, Johnson’s capstone project would go on to become the road map she would implement as the Program Director to establish the Solidarity Building Initiative for Liberative Carceral Education at McCormick Theological Seminary.

Courses Taught

• Workshop: Healing and Justice Conversation Series (Fall 2021 and Fall 2022)

• Workshop: Body Centered Practices for Community Healing (Summer 2022)

• Workshop: Through These Bars (Fall 2022)