“We invest in people’s humanity so they can be empowered to change their lives.”
Founded with the nation's first charter school inside a county jail, Five Keys believes every person deserves the opportunity to learn, heal, and build a brighter future. We provide FREE adult education for Californians ages 16 to 96 who want to earn a GED, HiSET, or high school diploma—because it's never too late to change the course of a life. Our College Pathways program helps students continue their education and pursue meaningful careers.
Each year, Five Keys serves more than 15,000 people at over 70 locations throughout California, including 17 county jails across 14 counties. By bringing education directly into communities and correctional facilities, we create opportunities for people who have too often been left behind.
Our work extends far beyond the classroom. We provide workforce development, behavioral health services, reentry support, and innovative housing solutions that help people overcome barriers, regain stability, and reconnect with their families and communities.
What truly sets Five Keys apart is our people. Nearly 60% of our workforce has lived experience with incarceration. They have walked the same roads as the people they now serve, transforming their own stories into powerful examples of hope, resilience, and possibility. Today, they are educators, mentors, outreach workers, housing specialists, first responders, and leaders proving every day that second chances save lives. Together, they have reversed more than 2,500 overdoses, demonstrating the extraordinary impact of compassion, trust, and lived experience.
That belief comes to life through Home Free, one of the nation's first housing communities for formerly incarcerated survivors of domestic violence and human trafficking. For women who spent decades in prison after enduring horrific abuse, Home Free offers something many have never experienced: safety, healing, dignity, and the opportunity to rebuild their lives.
Five Keys has become a national model for breaking cycles of poverty, incarceration, homelessness, and trauma. Every year, thousands of people earn diplomas, secure housing, reunite with their families, enter the workforce, and build stable futures. Every day, Five Keys staff respond to overdoses, mentor people returning home from prison, help individuals move from homelessness into permanent housing, and teach students who were once told they would never graduate.
Every diploma earned, every person housed, every overdose reversed, and every life transformed reflects our belief that lasting change begins by investing in human potential. Your support makes this work possible. Every investment helps open a classroom, provide a safe place to live, prepare someone for employment, reunite a family, or offer hope to someone who has been told too many times that change is impossible.
Together, we are creating safer communities, stronger families, and brighter futures across California—proving that when we invest in people, second chances don't just change lives; they transform generations.
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