|
PLEASE
HELP SAPE GET A NEW MIDDLE EAST PENPAL PROGRAM STARTED
! ! ! |
Who Are We and What Do We Do?
SAPE (called "The Soviet-American Penfriend Exchange" prior to 1991) matches people from the around the world with penpals in the former Soviet Union and the Baltic Nations. Since 1989, we've matched nearly 100,000 pen pals .... but we currently have approximately 20,000 people from the CIS/Baltics who are waiting to be matched with a pen pal.
SAPE's only goal is to foster international understanding and help people to learn about the former Soviet Union and the Baltic nations on a one-to-one basis.
Although SAPE helps many kinds of groups to match their members with pen pals, SAPE is not a branch of any other organization and has no official affiliations with any government, political party, or religious group.
A Few Things To Know About The SAPE Pen Pal Program
SAPE pen pals correspond by postal mail - these are not email pals.
This program is for ages 10 and older (adults as well as children, although we are primarily an organization for children).
The primary language of correspondence is English, however, we are always looking for people who can correspond in Russian! There are also some pen pals who can write in French or German.
Penpals are matched on the basis of age, gender, common language, and choice of male or female pen pal only. We don't have the information available to do matches on the basis of hobbies, religion, profession, or marital status. We also do not have information on the physical appearance of pen pals and do not have photos of pen pals.
SAPE IS NOT A
MARRIAGE AGENCY ! ! ! Please don't write to us for the purpose of finding
a spouse.
| How Did
SAPE Get Started?
SAPE began as the dream of two penpals, Michele (Cervoni) Anderson of the USA and Marina Prokhorova of Russia, who began their own correspondence in the mid-1970's, well before the days of Glasnost, Perestroika, and Mikhail Gorbachev. The two wrote letters to some Soviet newspapers, and in August 1989, "Pionerskaya Pravda" printed their letter, and the mail from the former Soviet Union has never stopped arriving since then!! SAPE and The Peace Corps Some of the participants from the CIS and Baltic countries are the students of U.S. Peace Corps Volunteers who are serving as English teachers in those countries and who use correspondence with SAPE pen pals as part of their curriculum. SAPE has worked with Peace Corps Volunteers in Lithuania, Latvia, Moldova, Ukraine, Kazakstan, Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan. |
 by Galina Pankrats, 16 Blagoveshchensk, Russia |
Why Write By Postal Mail When There Is The Internet?
While schools in the USA, Canada, and many other countries are now connected to the internet, the same is not true for most schools in the former Soviet Union countries. The more than 20,000 letters we've received from people in the Baltics and C.I.S. come from people who don't have computers and have no access to the internet. Kids in the Baltics and C.I.S. are eager to participate in the same kind of intercultural dialog that students in other countries are experiencing. Unfortunately, our more difficult task is finding people who are willing to write to them by postal mail. It's a slower, more costly method, but until all schools in the former USSR countries are computerized (which won't be for at least several years), this is the only means that these particular people have of making friends abroad.
What Other Organizations Have Participated In SAPE?
In addition to
the more than 850 schools that have taken part in this program, local chapters
of the following organizations have participated over the past 10
years:
| The Boy
Scouts The Girl Scouts Camp Fire Boys & Girls 4-H Clubs Catholic Youth Organization Nat'l. Federation of Temple Youth United Synagogue Youth Big Brothers-Big Sisters Kiwanis Youth Circle K |
Boys &
Girls Club Girls Inc Boys Clubs YMCA Afterschool Programs Young Life United Methodist Youth Youth For Christ B'nai B'rith Youth Organization AFS Intercultural Programs Alpha Phi Omega |
Other Accolades
SAPE was one of several pen pal organizations recommended by THE BOY SCOUTS OF AMERICA in the October 1997 issue of their SCOUTING magazine.
SAPE was one of several pen pal organizations recommended by THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC SOCIETY in the November 1990 issue of their WORLD magazine for children.
SAPE was the subject of a feature article by the international children's newswire service, CHILDREN'S EXPRESS. Their in-depth story was the result of six months of interviews with SAPE participants (and their teachers) in the USA, Russia, and Kazakstan. One newspaper that carried the article was THE INDIANAPOLIS STAR , who printed it in their February 10, 1992 issue.