Students

Puget Sound Student Gives a Voice to People Behind Bars

Nola Thury ’22 is an advocate for immigrant rights and incarcerated people

Nola Thury ’22 was a first-year student when they attended their first event at the Northwest Detention Center. Surprised to learn that there was a detention facility holding immigrants only a few miles from University of Puget Sound’s campus in Tacoma, Wash., Thury was determined to raise awareness of the plight of detainees and undocumented immigrants among fellow students. They became involved with the student group Advocates for Detained Voices, which works on immigrant rights issues, eventually taking on a leadership position, effectively channeling their passion into action.

“My sophomore year, the Tacoma City Council was debating new regulations around the detention center, so we worked with Puget Sound Outdoors to organize a bike ride down to the city council meeting,” Thury recalls. “It was powerful to have the floor for two minutes to speak up as students and make an impact.”

Nola Thury ’22 is determined to improve the lives of those them, whether fellow Puget Sound students, undocumented immigrants, or participants in Freedom Education Project Puget Sound.

Since then, Thury has been an outspoken advocate on campus for the people incarcerated in the Northwest Detention Center, which is operated by a private firm on behalf of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security. They’ve organized protests, campus events, boycotts, and fundraisers for La Resistencia, a Tacoma-based nonprofit that is working to end detentions and deportations in Washington state.

Nola Thury ’22

“As students, we have a lot of influence, whether we realize it or not.”

Thury’s volunteer work led them to become more deeply involved in issues of criminal justice reform and incarceration, eventually resulting in a position with the Freedom Education Project Puget Sound (FEPPS), a university-run program that brings rigorous liberal arts education to people incarcerated at the Washington Corrections Center for Women in nearby Gig Harbor. As a student worker for the program, Thury helps facilitate a weekly study hall at the correctional center.

“A lot of what I do is bring in resources. Research abilities inside the prison are pretty limited, so the students will write down what topics they’re interested in, like an overview of how NAFTA impacted farm labor, for instance, and I’ll work with other students and librarians on campus to track down articles for them,” Thury says. “The next week, I’d bring in this huge, 500-page stack of articles. I remember sitting in my room with every inch of the floor covered in paper, because I had to double check that everybody was getting what they needed and making sure that it was all stapled correctly.”

Nola Thury ’22 talks with a woman at a table

For Thury, their education at Puget Sound as an English major and global development studies minor has been instrumental in shaping their advocacy and developing their sense of purpose.

“My professors and student activists, such as the authors of the MIBU Demands, have instilled in me a deep belief in the power of change—and especially of students making change. As students, we have a lot of influence, whether we realize it or not. I encourage all of my peers to think about how you can use the resources you have to make an impact.”

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