Name: Maya Mehta
Class Year: 2026
Major: Political Science 

Name: Filomena Baker
Class Year: 2026
Major: Political Science 

Internship Organization: Prison Radio
Internship Title:   Summer Interns
Location: Philadelphia, PA
 
What’s happening at your internship? We would love to hear what kind of work you are doing!  

Doing repairs on our first week on the job!

As interns, Prison Radio delivers us something new and exciting every day. From producing a short-form movie to exploring political prisoner Mumia Abu-Jamal’s archives, we have learned the importance of Prison Radio’s abolition work. For the first few weeks of our internship, we immersed ourselves in Prison Radio’s vast catalogue of prisoner correspondent commentaries, sifting through thousands of Prison Radio’s audio files to transcribe and migrate them onto the website. We were then tasked with familiarizing ourselves with our Donor Network, writing hundreds of Thank You Cards to donors every day, whether they donated 5 dollars or 500. We quickly learned that our donor network, the people who believe in prison abolition, is the very backbone of the work we do, and that they are integral in keeping our national abolitionist community network strong. As we become more accustomed to how PR runs, we now spend our days writing eblasts for our network, organizing PR’s extensive archives, conducting research for different special projects, and, occasionally, we still write Thank You cards.

Why did you apply for this internship?  

Us in the Prison Radio office

We wanted to intern at PR because we believe in the dismantlement of the hegemonic structure of the Amerikan empire. Prison Radio has been working against the prison-industrial complex for over 3 decades, broadcasting commentaries from incarcerated individuals and exposing human rights violations within the U.S. prison system. Additionally, the organization’s website has thousands of audio commentaries, art pieces, and resources relating to prison abolition, providing important content to the public that may have otherwise been unavailable. In the face of increased political repression and the expansion of carceral systems into our schools, hospitals, and places of work, the choice to intern with Prison Radio this summer was an easy one.

What has been your favorite part of this internship?  

After some initial hiccups in timing, we, along with other PR interns and our boss, met up at a small Indian restaurant in West Philly before embarking on a road trip. We were heading West to Pittsburgh. After driving 5 hours, we finally arrived at our first destination: the Monroeville Red Roof Inn Plus. We go to bed early that night, to wake for our next destination: the North Point Breeze Estate. The event: the fundraiser for the Abolitionist Law Center, an organization we work closely with.   

We arrive and are immediately put to work, tasked with helping create a charcuterie board, setting up seating, and greeting attendees at the door. All the writing of hundreds of Thank You cards came to fruition as we finally met the people who we had been addressing in our notes, and who have been keeping Prison Radio alive from afar. At the event, we met artists, lawyers, and long-time political and community organizers, hearing their stories and learning from them.   

Although it was hot and sunny, the event itself was one of the most memorable moments of our summer with Prison Radio. Being able to contextualize Prison Radio’s work within the larger context of abolitionism reminded us how early we are in our organizing journeys, and how the education we’ve had at Bryn Mawr is just the beginning. 

What is most rewarding about your internship?  

It’s the night of our movie premiere. It was the moment we’d been looking forward to for weeks. Just a month earlier, we had received an email from the Free Mumia Coalition in London looking for a 15 to 20-minute video of Mumia Abu-Jamal’s archives. Because of our boss’ close professional relationship with Mumia, Prison Radio has a large amount of Mumia’s mail, legal documents, and doctoral thesis work. We had a lot of work to do, and all the interns banded together to write a script, film B-roll, produce commentary, and interview people for the movie.   

After 3 weeks, we completed our movie and showed it to our boss. She immediately suggested hosting an official movie premiere in our office. Our work was far from over. We spent the next week calling and emailing people in the Philly area within our network.   

On the night of the premier, we had a full house, and we got to show our movie and meet the community members in Philly that had been a part of the Prison Radio network for years. It was incredibly rewarding to go through the process of researching, writing, and producing our film, and then getting to finally share it with others who cared for the work we have done just as much as we did.