Dear PDN Members and Friends,

We are completing our most successful year ever in Prison Dharma Network’s twenty-two years of bringing transformative practices and hope for a better life to the men, women and youth incarcerated in our jails, prisons and juvenile facilities.  As many of you know, we moved our offices last year from Colorado to Rhode Island in order to be close enough to a number of adult prisons to run our own researched-based programs.  We are now located just 15 minutes from the seven adult facilities operated by the Rhode Island Department of Corrections.  We have already established successful programs in three of these facilities and will be adding at least one facility a year. 

This fall we began our first research initiative with forty male prisoners participating in our Path of Freedom program at a medium security facility.  This is part of a five-year study that will include several different facilities.  Our aim is to establish mindfulness-based programs as evidence based practice (EBP) in the field of Corrections, the key to mainstreaming such programs throughout the system.  We will also launch a mindfulness and emotional intelligence training program for correctional counselors and probation officers, the first of its kind in the country, in January 2012.

We are in the final weeks of our 2011 Year End fundraising campaign during which we need to raise a very large percent of our budget for 2012.  Our goal of mainstreaming mindfulness-based programming in corrections will require a substantial increase in our overall funding now and in the coming years. 

Please make a generous donation at this time and invest in our work of transforming lives and society through the power of mindfulness practices.  We reach tens of thousands of prisoners, prison staff, former prisoners, family members, at-risk youth and volunteers every year in our efforts to make these transformative practices and teachings universally available.

Please donate now at: http://www.prisondharmanetwork.org/donate.html

Wishing everyone a healthy and prosperous 2012,

Fleet Maull

Acharya Fleet Maull

Founder, Prison Dharma Network

“I am pleased to learn that Prison Dharma Network is working to support rehabilitation through education and other activities within the prison system.  I am confident that these projects will be of long term benefit both to prison inmates and society at large and offer my prayers for their success.”      His Holiness the Dalai Lama

“I have been honored to serve as a spiritual advisor to the Prison Dharma Network since its founding and fully endorse the work they continue to accomplish.  Through my own experience with prisoners, I have directly witnessed the transformative potential of prison meditation programs.  Please support Prison Dharma Network in any way you can.”  Pema Chodron

"I have tremendous respect for the work of the Prison Dharma Network. It nurtures freedom, inner peace, and human kindness in places where there is precious little of it... a true example of rehabilitation in its deepest sense: learning to live inside (one's own body and heart) again. This is necessary work in our society, which, believe it or not, incarcerates a higher percentage of its population than any other country in the world."
Jon Kabat-Zinn