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Cornell Law students meet with the debate team at Auburn Correctional Facility before the COVID-19 suspension of in-person programming. This fall, we are limiting our number of courses while piloting remote teaching technologies such as teleconferencing which are, thus far, unprecedented in NYS prisons.
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In this newsletter
- Remembering Doris Buffett of the Sunshine Lady Foundation
- $100K from the Mellon Foundation
- New: CPEP Alumni Advisory Council
- CPEP sponsors racial equity training for state's in-prison college programs (with the Racial Equity Institute)
- Donor spotlight: Gila and Scott Belsky
- Students send thanks
- Follow us on Twitter!
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 Doris Buffett (1928-2020)
CPEP was launched with a grant from the Sunshine Lady Foundation, founded by Doris Buffett. This support elevated Cornell's early offering of a few prison courses at Auburn to a regular degree-granting program there. Above, Doris poses with the first graduating class at Auburn prison in 2012.
An early supporter of higher education in prison, Doris always attended graduation ceremonies. Her witty, no-nonsense zingers drew people to their feet in applause.
"I will never forget her devotion to attending our December 2014 graduation in a blizzard, arriving mid-ceremony from Virginia through twelve inches of snow and up the tremendous staircase to the Auburn auditorium," recalls CPEP faculty and co-founding board member Mary Katzenstein.
CPEP Executive Director Rob Scott said, "Doris Buffett walked the walk. We would not be where we are today were it not for her."
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We were happy to spot Byron Brown (CPEP AA '14, center) in this photo from Sing Sing CF where he is pursuing his Bachelor's from Mercy College via Hudson Link. (Photo is from the Marshall Project's in-prison newsletter News Inside.) |
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Andrew W. Mellon Foundation Awards CPEP $100K
We are proud to announce that, this month, the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation awarded CPEP a $100,000 grant to maintain and adjust our programming during the COVID-19 pandemic.
CPEP will use these critical and timely funds to
- Retain a key staff member coordinating remote learning opportunities for our incarcerated students
- Launch an Alumni Advisory Council (see story in this newsletter.)
- Create digital (video) academic content for incarcerated students
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 CPEP Alumni Advisory Board is Formed
Earlier in August, CPEP sent letters to seven men, inviting them to serve on the program's inaugural alumni advisory council. All seven accepted the invitation and convened a lively and promising first meeting last week.
While five of the seven advisors studied with CPEP while incarcerated, the council members affiliations also include Bard College, Columbia University, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, and NYU. All members have continued to excel outside of prison and are thoughtful activists in various fields, from social work to justice reform to business entrepreneurship.
"We recognize that the ideas and guidance offered by this group will be as varied as their literary versus legal versus social work leanings," said Academic Director Tess Wheelwright, "but we also know there are questions and future projects only those who have experienced incarceration can help CPEP answer and develop."
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 Donor Spotlight:
Kaplan Family Foundation Supports CPEP
This June, the Rita J. and Stanley H. Kaplan Family Foundation generously contributed $5,000 to CPEP, thanks to the recommendation of Cornellians Scott Belsky '02 and Gila Belsky Modell '13, directors of the Foundation.
The Foundation partners with arts, education, health, Jewish and social organizations that empower people, and it has supported CPEP before, as well as Entrepreneurship@cornell, Cornell Hillel, and the Jacobs Technion-Cornell Institute.
This latest gift to CPEP provides critical support for our ongoing work to bring college education to people in prison, even during the pandemic and economic uncertainty.
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CPEP Sponsors Equity Training for NYS Prison Ed. Programs
CPEP is proud to sponsor virtual training from the Racial Equity Institute (REI) and make that training available to staff and faculty of CPEP as well as of other New York State prison education programs.
The Groundwater, as the training course is called, will take place in late November and will have space for 100 members of the New York Consortium for Higher Education in Prison, which comprises over 20 such college-in-prison programs including all the larger players.
REI is an alliance of trainers, organizers, and institutional leaders who help organizations and individuals understand and overcome racism. Learn more.
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An anonymous student sends his thanks from Elmira CF
 "This program has saved me in multiple ways," writes a CPEP student from Elmira Correctional Facility. "I am grateful that there are still people in this world that care about me enough to take their time and come into a prison. This has been a redemptive opportunity for me, and I am greatly appreciative of that fact also."
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Follow CPEP on Twitter
We finally have our own Twitter account!
Follow us @CornellPrisonEd for the latest CPEP highlights and the best awe-inspiring stories about incarcerated men and women pursuing education. |
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