A PROJECT manager at Dartmoor Prison has been nominated for a national award for her pioneering scheme maintaining contact between imprisoned fathers and their children. Sharon Berry developed the charity Storybook Dads in 2002, which encourages prisoners to record bedtime stories for their children to listen to at home. It is a project aimed to reverse the findings of research which showed 40% of fathers in prison lose contact with their children within five years. She is one of three to battle it out at the finals for the national Public Servants of the Year Award 2006 in the Breaking New Ground category. They will attend the awards ceremony at a London hotel on May 17. Sharon said she is delighted for her work on the scheme to be recognised at a national level. Originally recording and editing the tapes in her spare time, Sharon now trains the prisoners in editing and the service has been extended to 30 other prisons in England and Wales with more than 1,500 inmates now taking part. The project has received £295,000 through fundraising and it will be funded now until August 2008.
