Fresh out of anything.high school.a relationship you had to leave.twenty years at the same job.foster care.prison.options. Ready for what's next.
Every next chapter runs on technology now: the job application, the bank account, the AI tools everyone suddenly expects you to know. We teach all of it, starting from whatever you already know, until you can do it without us.
Tech literacy, open to everyone.
FreshOut Education is a Los Angeles nonprofit founded in 2019 to teach tech skills to people coming home from incarceration. We've since opened our doors wider: to anyone starting over, whether you're aging out of foster care, leaving a relationship, exiting a career, finishing school without a plan, or just ready for a change. We offer free training in tech, financial literacy, and job readiness, because everyone deserves a real shot at a fresh start.
Read the whole story
Four course tracks. Start with any one.
Every track is free, taught virtually on Zoom or in person in Los Angeles, and stands on its own. Take the one you need now and come back for the others. We built these four because each one decides something concrete: whether you can open an account, finish an application, use the tools an employer assumes you know, and hold the job once you have it.
An in-depth training on budgeting, debt, saving, credit, money mindset, and more, built to help you move from “I don’t know where to start” to “I have a real plan,” without judgement or complicated jargon.
You walk out able to:
- Open and run a real bank account from your phone
- Build credit from zero and use a credit card without it using you
- Pull your credit report and free score and fix what’s wrong on it
- Create a budget that actually works for your life
- Recognize the scams aimed at you specifically
An in-depth training on your phone, your accounts, and the forms and portals that run your life, taught step by step so you go from avoiding your own settings menu to running it yourself.
You walk out able to:
- Navigate your phone, set up email, and manage your accounts and passwords
- Get back into a locked account on your own
- Get through a benefits, housing, or health portal on your own
- Fill out, sign, save, and send a document
- Join and run a Zoom or Google Meet call, camera, mic, screen share, and all
An in-depth training on using AI to make your life easier, explaining a letter, drafting an email, planning your week, for anyone who’s heard about AI and hasn’t been shown what it can actually do for them.
You walk out able to:
- Set up an AI assistant and write a prompt that actually works
- Use AI to explain a letter, bill, lease, or job posting in plain terms
- Draft a résumé, an email to a landlord, or a message to a caseworker with AI
- Catch when AI gets something wrong and know when to double check it
- Protect your information: what never to paste into an AI tool
An in-depth training on your story, your rights, and getting past what stands between you and a yes, for anyone whose résumé doesn’t fit the template, whatever the reason, a gap, a record, an unfinished degree, or a life that didn’t go in a straight line.
You walk out able to:
- Know what an employer can legally ask you, and what they owe you in return
- Search and apply for jobs strategically, build a network, and line up references that actually help
- Build a résumé that gets past automated screening
- Interview with a clear, structured story and record a video interview you’re willing to send
- Fill out the paperwork a job hands you: W-2s, 1099s, tax withholding, health insurance enrollment
Why we teach this.
require digital skills
The people we teach are not short on capability. They are short on the years everyone else got to pick this up quietly, and in a city that runs on accounts and portals, those years decide what comes next.
So we teach it, free, and always will. Nobody should have to buy their way back into what the world already assumes they know.
- Free, always. No fees, no catch.
- Virtual or in person trainings.
- Starting from what you know.
- Finished when you can do it alone.
of job ads now require digital skills
National Skills Coalition, 2023unemployment rate among formerly incarcerated people
Vs. 5-6% for the general population. Prison Policy Initiative, 2022do not reoffend within three years
When they maintain employment for a full year post-release. U.S. Chamber, 2021American adults have no credit history at all
26 million people. CFPB, 2015We teach both sides of the room.
One door for people who are starting over. One for the community-based nonprofits who work with them every day.
For people
You don't need experience. You need a seat.
Money, tech, AI, and getting hired, taught in a room by people who understand what you are dealing with.
Find a program
For organizations
Bring FreshOut to your building.
Host our programs for your clients, or bring us in to train your staff on AI and technology, starting wherever your team is now.
See how it worksWe will never assume you already know.
Banking, benefits, housing, and hiring are all built for someone who already knows how they work. Most people picked that up gradually, over years. The people we teach did not get those years.
Virtual or in person
Sessions run virtually on Zoom, or in person in Los Angeles, at partner sites and on our own.
Built from lived experience
The curriculum came out of reentry work here, shaped by people who have been through it.
Reentry first, then everyone
We began in 2019 with money skills for people coming home from incarceration, then widened to tech, AI, and work as more of our community needed them too.
Plain language, no judgment
The same information a financial advisor would give a client with ten times the income.
Nobody taught you this. We will.
Fund a seat, host a program at your site, or refer someone who is starting over.