INPEP ECHO

About Indiana Peer Education Program ECHO

The Indiana Peer Education Program (INPEP) ECHO promotes health education within correctional facilities through peer-to-peer trainings and the Project ECHO model. The INPEP ECHO team equips people who are incarcerated as peer health educators, who then use their lived experience to teach health education workshops about unique health conditions affecting people who are incarcerated.

Peer educators:

Develop their professional and leadership skills
Serve as a key resource for health information within correctional facilities
Partake in monthly TeleECHOs
Meet with a Peer Education Hub Team member at their site

To date, the INPEP ECHO has trained over 200 peer educators at multiple Indiana Department of Correction locations. Peer educators have reached thousands of people incarcerated through their 10-hour health education workshops.

The Indiana Peer Education Program is a collaboration between the Indiana University Indianapolis ECHO Center, Step-Up, Inc., the Viral Hepatitis Program at the Indiana Department of Health, and the Indiana Department of Correction.

Putnamville Correctional Facility, 2023.

Madison Correctional Facility Graduation: March 2022

The CDC's Viral Hepatitis Program visit to the Correctional Industrial Facility.

Goals

Present Facts
Explore Values
Develop Skills
Eliminate Stigma

Facilities participating

Correctional Industrial Facility
Indiana Women's Prison
Madison Correctional Facility
New Castle Correctional Facility
Pendleton Correctional Facility
Plainfield Correctional Facility
Putnamville Correctional Facility
Rockville Correctional Facility
Wabash Valley Correctional Facility
Westville Correctional Facility

10-Hour Workshop Training Topics

Germs & General Hygiene
Tuberculosis
Diabetes
Staph/MRSA
STIs
Influenza

COVID-19
HIV/AIDS
Hepatitis A, B, C
Substance Use Disorders
Harm Reduction
Mental Health First AID & Trauma Informed Care

Hub Team

Jessica Beyer, CHW/CRS

Jessica Beyer

PEP Program Manager | Step-Up, Inc.

Jessica Beyer began working with the Indiana Peer Education Program, INPEP, and Step-Up while incarcerated in the Indiana Department of Corrections in 2019. Upon release, Beyer knew she wanted to continue helping others and work in the criminal justice field. She wants others experiencing incarceration to feel the way she did with her involvement in the Indiana Peer Education program, as well as educate her community about health disparities and harm reduction. Her goal is for others to not be judged or belittled, but to be part of a community and feel accepted.

Abigail Carr, MPH, CHW/CRS

Abigail Carr

Director of Re-Entry Services | Step-Up, Inc.

After completing her Bachelor of Science at the University of Dayton in 2015, Abby found her passion for public health while serving a year with AIDS United AmeriCorps. In 2016, she pursued her Master of Public Health at the University of Indianapolis and began her career at Step-Up, Inc. Abby served as the program manager for the Indiana Peer Education Program during its inception and has since transitioned into the role of Director of Reentry. In this position, Abby serves on the hub team for INPEP ECHO and oversees several health-focused reentry initiatives. Abby is a member of the Marion County Reentry Coalition ECHO Hub Team and serves as the Conference Chair for the 2024 Marion County Reentry Coalition Conference on Reentry.

Erika L. Chapman, MPH, CPH, CHES, CHW, RYT-200

Erika L. Chapman

Harm Reduction Prevention Manager | Indiana Department of Health: Division of HIV/STD & Viral Hepatitis

Erika currently serves as the Harm Reduction Program Manager with the Indiana Department of Health in the Division of HIV, STI, and Viral Hepatitis where she has served in various capacities since 2006.

Erika holds a Bachelor of Science in Psychology and minors in Theatre and Art from Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College. She earned her Master of Public Health with a concentration in Behavioral Health Science from Indiana University School of Medicine Department of Public Health. She has also earned Certified in Public Health, Certified Health Education Specialist, and Community Health Worker credentials. Outside of her work Erika loves to travel, knit, and pester her husband and two cats.

Tommy Chittenden, GRPA

Tommy Chittenden

PEP Engagement Specialist | Step-Up, Inc.

Tommy is a long-time Hoosier with 25 years of experience in the travel industry before transitioning to Step-Up and becoming the first Director of Re-Entry. He semi-retired in 2017 and spent several years specializing in prevention work for various topics such as homelessness, domestic violence, and vehicle crashes resulting in injury/death.

He returned to Step-Up in 2024 as the Peer Education Program Engagement Specialist to specifically work with INPEP graduates on the threshold of re-entry to community and family life.

Kevin Henry

PEP Program Specialist | Step-Up, Inc.

Kevin holds degrees in Addictions Counseling/Human Services and Sociology. He began as a Peer Educator with the first team of INPEP in Indiana and continued that role until his release in March of 2024. He now proudly works at Step-Up, Inc. as a Peer Education Program Specialist and will be working primarily with released Peer Educators. Kevin wants everyone to feel as purposeful and accepted as he did working with INPEP, and to resist being boxed or labeled, decide what they want for their life outside or inside, grab it, and don't let go.

Patrick Hibbard, Ph.D.

Patrick Hibbard

Program Evaluator | INPEP ECHO

With a Ph.D. in Public Management from the O’Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs (IU-Bloomington), Patrick Hibbard studies programs and organizational management in the criminal legal system and substance use policy areas, using a variety of methodologies. His interest in researching and improving programs in these areas stems from his identity as a person with lived experience in both the U.S. criminal legal system and recovery from substance use disorder. In addition to serving as program evaluator for INPEP-ECHO, he is a postdoctoral fellow with the Oregon Social Learning Center.

Andrea Janota, MPH

Andrea Janota

Director | IU Indianapolis ECHO Center

Andrea was involved at the ground level in establishing the first ECHOs in Indiana and today leads more than a dozen topic-specific programs.

Andrea uses her career to create spaces for people to feel that they belong and to be empowered through an authentic and peer-led community. She is passionate about diversity and inclusion, particularly racial equity.

Andrea additionally serves as an adjunct faculty in the Department of Epidemiology and is completing her doctoral degree in Global Health Leadership. Andrea received an MPH in Global Health from Boston University, a B.S. in Public Health and Social Justice from Saint Louis University, and dedicated a year of service to AmeriCorps in Boston, MA.

Deborah Nichols, MPH, MS, CHW

Deborah Nichols

Epidemiologist | Indiana Department of Correction (IDOC)

Deborah Nichols serves as the epidemiologist for the Indiana Department of Correction (IDOC). Until May 2022 she was the Deputy Surveillance Program Director and former viral hepatitis and harm reduction program director within the Division of HIV/STD and Viral Hepatitis at the Indiana Department of Health (IDOH). She received an AAS/BS from Purdue University in Management and Aviation Technology in 1994, her MPH from IU School of Medicine with a concentration in epidemiology in 2007, and an MS in Geology in 2010 from Indiana University Indianapolis. Deborah has worked both in the private and public sectors throughout her career both stateside and overseas. She is interested in how data can be used to address health disparities.

Jenna Watkins

Program Management Specialist | IU Indianapolis ECHO Center

Jenna serves as a program management specialist for various ECHO programs focusing on correctional health and improving access to hepatitis C care. Before her current role, she completed a year of service as an EHE AmeriCorps member. Jenna’s placement site was Step-Up, Inc., a local non-profit in Marion County, where she focused on continuous programmatic development of the INPEP ECHO, including offering case management services to returning citizens. Jenna is passionate about the work the INPEP peer educators and hub team are doing to reduce health disparities within the Indiana Department of Corrections and beyond.

Jenna graduated from IU Indianapolis in 2021 with a B.A. in Anthropology and is currently enrolled at the Richard M. Fairbanks School of Public Health in the Master of Public Health (MPH) program, with a concentration in Social and Behavioral Sciences.