Formerly incarcerated men now pursuing higher education find community at Harlem’s Ignacio House

Since 2019, Ignacio House has housed 15 “resident scholars” who study at N.Y. colleges and universities at a site in the Bronx. Last month, the community received permission from the Archdiocese of New York to move into its new home at the site of a one-time residence of the Edmund Rice Christian Brothers in Manhattan. The new location will do double duty—a living space for the program’s resident scholars like Zach, who asked to be identified by his first name only, and the offices of Ignacio House’s parent organization, Thrive For Life Prison Project, Inc. The relocation is the first step in a nationwide expansion for Thrive For Life which will include new communities opening in Wisconsin, Louisiana and Washington, D.C.