From Prison Cells to Clear Vision: Wyoming Inmates Help the World See Again

With input from K2 Radio and Wyoming News Now.

Behind the razor wire at the Wyoming State Penitentiary, something unexpectedly hopeful is happening.

In a workshop tucked inside the prison, young inmates in the Youthful Offender Transition Program (YOTP) spend their days cleaning, fixing, and sorting old eyeglasses. Those glasses don’t stay in Rawlins for long. Once they’re refurbished, they’re shipped out through the Lions Club’s Recycle for Sight Program to people around the world who can’t afford vision care.

It’s part community service, part job training — and for many of these young men, it’s also a shot at redemption.

The Lions Club has run its Recycle for Sight effort for years, collecting used eyeglasses, refurbishing them, and sending them to people in need across the globe. In Wyoming, that mission has taken a unique form through a partnership with the state penitentiary.

At the Wyoming State Penitentiary, it’s the YOTP inmates who do the hands-on work:

• Cleaning each donated pair;
• Repairing frames, screws, and nose pads;
• Reading prescriptions to figure out lens strength;
• Sorting by gender and age group—men, women, and children;
• Organizing by prescription strength so they’re ready to match to new wearers.

Once they’re done, the glasses go back to the Lions Club and eventually land in communities around the world where a simple pair of lenses can change a life — helping someone read at school, hold a job, or just see their loved ones clearly.

The program at WSP officially launched on October 20, 2025, and it didn’t take long to gain momentum.

Since then, inmates in the Youthful Offender Transition Program have already refurbished around 2,000 pairs of eyeglasses.

That’s not just a number. For each pair, there’s a person on the other end who may have gone years without being able to see clearly. In many parts of the world, eye exams and prescription glasses are a luxury. A recycled pair can mean:

• A child being able to see the board at school;
• A farmer reading labels and instructions;
• An elder being able to sew, read, or recognize faces again.

And all of that starts with someone in a prison workshop, carefully tightening a screw or wiping a lens.

For the young men working in the shop, it’s not just another prison assignment.

“This program is about more than eyeglasses,” a Lions Club spokesperson said. “It’s about giving young offenders a sense of purpose and showing them that even behind bars, their actions can make a real difference in the world.”

That message is baked into the Youthful Offender Transition Program itself, which is designed to help younger inmates develop skills, responsibility, and a different view of themselves before they return to the community.

Here, they’re not just learning technical skills — like basic repairs, organization, and attention to detail—but also:

• Accountability: They’re trusted with items that will directly impact other people’s lives.
• Service: They’re helping strangers they’ll never meet.
• Perspective: They see firsthand how small, repetitive tasks can add up to something meaningful.

For people often defined only by what landed them in prison, that can be powerful.

The program depends on one simple thing: people donating their used glasses instead of tossing them in a drawer or the trash.

If you’d like to help:

• Donate your old eyeglasses — prescription lenses, reading glasses, and even children’s frames can be useful.
• Take them to a Lions Club collection site in your community. Most towns have drop-off boxes at optometrists’ offices, community centers, or other public spots.
• Your donation will eventually make its way to a place like the Wyoming State Penitentiary workshop, where it will get a second life — and give someone else a clearer view of theirs.

To find a collection site, just contact your local Lions Club organization.

On paper, this is a simple recycling program: old eyeglasses go in, cleaned and repaired glasses come out.

But inside the Wyoming State Penitentiary, it’s become something bigger. It’s a rare win-win:

• People around the world get the gift of clear vision.
• Young inmates get a chance to practice responsibility, skill-building, and service — and to feel like they’re doing something good, not just serving time.

By helping restore sight, these men are also helping restore hope — for strangers in faraway places, for their own futures, and for a community willing to believe that good can come from unlikely places.