Unique music program helping to cut re-offending rates

Wandoo Reintegration Facility's Rap'N'Radio music program has been featured on the ABC News.

Delivered in partnership with the Central Institute of Technology and designed to promote literacy skills, the Rap'N'Radio program is led by Downsyde musician Scott Griffiths, also known as MC Optamus.

Griffiths teaches residents who attend the weekly classes how to write, produce, edit and record hip-hop music. One resident told the ABC the program has become a form of self-reflection.

"For me it's like talking to somebody and getting problems off my chest," he said.

"It's about the expression and I feel so much better after.

"They're personal lyrics about my time in here and my family that have supported me through it and are waiting for me. That it hasn't been all for nothing.

"It's two years of my life that's been taken but at the same time I've gained so much from it as a person."

Griffiths, who does outreach and educational work in remote communities, told the ABC the program was about engagement.

"The incarceration rates of Indigenous people in WA is way too high," he said.

"Rap'N'Radio helps them have the chance not to become another statistic."

Wandoo manager Wendy Sinclair told the outlet that Rap'N'Radio was one of the best initiatives at the facility.

"We talk a lot about them being a prisoner of their life and an architect of their future and what Rap'N'Radio does is it grips them," she said.

"It's their language. They understand music and they're passionate about music.

"Some of them have clicked onto learning, they've learned to read and write so they can go on to college."

Griffiths said he would like to see similar music programs introduced into other facilities.

Read the full story at ABC News.