A WorkWell Graduate Shares His Personal Story
by E. Graham McKinley and Thomas Simonet
Even though he grew up on some of the toughest streets of Newark, Jamar Hightower’s prospects were good.
A member of his high school football team, he also was into making music, becoming adept with drums, trumpet and tuba. He had scholarship offers from universities including Delaware State, Howard and Temple.
“I had it all,” he said.
Then it all fell apart.
A series of personal tragedies, gang opportunities and months living on the street culminated in a five-year sentence on drug and weapons charges.
Now Hightower is one of eight former inmates who graduated on Feb. 14, 2025, from WorkWell’s four-week training for people transitioning from prison to employment.
A series of traumatic events the year he turned 17 sent him reeling: The death of his father; the gang murder of a beloved older sister; then the death of a close friend and an aunt. As friends and teachers tried to console him, he felt his world closing in.
His solution was to flee.
“I stopped going to school, I started running with a gang,”he said. “I didn’t want to talk about it. I was really running from the situation.”
During his incarceration, he attended prison programs on such topics as anger management and resocialization, but he said these experiences had little effect.
“It was kind of like the instructors was pushing us along, because I’m a convicted felon, so it was something I had to do,” he recalled.
Upon his release, Hightower’s parole officer ordered him to live in Trenton, rather than Newark. That gave him the opportunity to participate in the WorkWell program, which he credits with turning his life around.
“It was different with WorkWell. It really felt like it was passionate, right from the heart,” he said. “I’ve never seen a program that’s really passionate about getting people on the right track.”
Living in Trenton forced him to rethink his life in other ways.
“I don’t know nobody in Trenton. It gave me a chance to have a clear mind and to really focus on what I’m doing instead of being around old habits.”
Getting on the right track — changing his life path — was a struggle, “like unprogramming,” he said. His convictions had included attempting to distribute cocaine, possession of weapons and racketeering, “a lot of bad stuff” he had engaged in during the years since that fateful decision to dropout of school and into gang life.
“I’m not going to say I didn’t know it was wrong, it was just the environment, it was easy to adapt to,” he said, recalling that he had even spent several frigid months living on the street.
WorkWell’s emphasis on planning multiple years ahead and setting long-term goals was unfamiliar territory for Hightower.
“I didn’t really want to hear it. I’m like, I can’t really see that far ahead,” he said. “I really live for the day to day. I can’t really worry about tomorrow until tomorrow gets here.
“But they told me that was a wrong way of thinking, because if I can’t see the big picture, then I’m not striving for nothing.”
The commitment of the WorkWell staff buoyed him in the struggle to push past his previous experiences and embrace new ideas. “They’re not trying to badger me, they’re not trying to say I was wrong to think like this,” he said. “That’s what I had to keep telling myself. I just have to think about it differently.”
Now he is focused on getting his GED and earning a commercial driver’s license, with the goal of eventually starting his own trucking company. “Driving is a passion. I love it. It’s the only time I get my brain at peace,” he said. He also looks forward to reconnecting with his daughters, 9 and 4, and he has already been hired to drive a forklift at Home Depot.
Hightower said he wants to continue his connection with WorkWell. Indeed, he wishes the program could expand to North Jersey and benefit people from his former life, including a family member who needs immediate help.
“He feels like he don’t have no resources up there,”Hightower said. “I’m trying to keep him from not going back to jail.”
Upon graduation from WorkWell, each student creates a “Vision Board” illustrating their accomplishments and goals. Hightower’s board prominently displays his new mantra, “Difficult roads lead to beautiful destinations.”
“I know where I’ve been, and I know where I’m trying to go,”he said. “The journey has to be hard. The way I look at it, the more struggle, the better. The more resilient I am.
“I would recommend this program to anybody coming home from a halfway house, county jail, prison. Give it a shot. It will work.”
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In the photo above, Jamar is receiving congratulatio0ns from 15th District Assemblyman Anthony Verrelli, who was the keynote speaker at WorkWell’s 27th graduation on February 14, 2025.
E. Graham McKinley and Thomas Simonet are retired professors of journalism.
