Volunteers personally respond to the letters and journals that prisoners mail in. Many prisoners have shared that receiving these handwritten correspondences has helped them cope with the loneliness and isolation of incarceration. A donation in this amount could buy a book of 20 stamps so participants can hear their name at mail call.

What are prisoners requesting to read? Alex, one of our student volunteers, hand-picks books for participants based on their interests. Philosophy, fiction, and dictionaries are popular requests. Other volunteers package and post them. A donation of this amount is like paying the postage to send two large packages of donated books to prisoners.

In addition to requesting books, prisoners can enroll in a variety of courses about history, science, crafts, creative writing, psychology, and meditation, just to name a few. Support at this level could fund programming costs like the postage to mail 250 distance learning packets via USPS bulk mail.

Many of these educational packets contain lesson plans created by Cornell students. A donation in this amount could cover the cost of printing 100 twenty-eight page volunteer-developed distance learning lessons.

The PE Poetry Program is equally popular among prisoners and Cornell student volunteers. Help fund programming costs like the printing and mailing of an edition of the PE Poetry Anthology to 500 prisoner-poets when you choose to give at this level.

Your donation could help with expenses associated with publishing and distributing an edition of the PE newsletter to over 4000 active members. Often newsletters will find their way into the hands of folks who aren't members but want to join PE. This is how the program has grown so quickly. And it continues to do so!

Prisoners can participate in a community read. This season's pick is Slaughterhouse-Five. Your gift may help provide postage to mail out a copy of Vonnegut's classic novel to participants in the PE Book Club.

Gifts of any amount are welcome and appreciated. If you would like to discuss additional ways to make a substantial gift to Prisoner Express in support of our programming, please contact Gary Fine, Program Director at gmf5@cornell.edu or 607-255-6486.