Volunteering

This annual campaign engages people around the globe to write letters, emails, tweets, and petitions to support the humane treatment and release of individual prisoners and other captives. Your words can and do make a difference—and resources like their Letter Writing Toolkit can help.

No matter how you want to help, you’ll find organizations here welcoming your support. Search “Find Opportunities” for what you want to do; terms like “writing,” “editing,” and “communications” yield an array of ways to dive in.

Catchafire’s Volunteering pages help you find nonprofits seeking writers, communicators, marketers, social media specialists, and more. Go to the Skills page to select those you want to provide, and you’ll get a list of orgs in need of your assistance.

Check out examples of blogs on topics ranging from homelessness and teen violence prevention to Women’s History Month. Intrigued? Sign up to write. LiveYourDream seeks volunteer bloggers to write about global girls’ and womens’ rights and issues for its blog.

This article features an array of powerful programs seeking correspondents—from The Braid Project’s efforts to raise the spirits of foster care children to Black and Pink, a pen pal program for incarcerated LGBT+ individuals, explore how to connect in meaningful ways.

With a mission to “encourage and empower girls and women around the world through handwritten letters,” TLP always seeks new writers aged 13 or older to pen meaningful missives. New letter requests appear regularly on the portal.

What started as a writing class for incarcerated women in the Tulsa County Jail has expanded to many other communities, with hundreds of volunteers helping thousands of participants find their voices and tell their stories.

This is a U.S. network of those creating art (including writing) from within, and for those impacted by the justice system. The site is particularly great for locating orgs offering internships to young journalists and bloggers.

This global organization taps translators around the world to help people in need connect across borders, languages, and cultures. If you’re multilingual, this is a great way to use your words to change lives.