Wednesday, April 23, 2014

Books for Charity

During this past horribly cold Minnesota winter, Kate and I have been book shopping.  Most Saturday mornings found us with a cup of hot coffee, in a preheated car, stopping at used book shops and thrift stores to find the best deals on good books.  We bought over 600 books! Not books for us though.  Here's the scoop:
Last winter we saw the film Girl Rising - a film about 12 different girls, in 12 different countries, who were struggling for the right to an education and a better life.  It was very powerful and it left us wanting to be able to help somehow.  We researched the various organizations featured on the Girl Rising website and decided to create a fundraising campaign for the organization Room to Read.
This is what Room to Read is about: We envision a world in which all children can pursue a quality education, reach their full potential and contribute to their community and the world.
To achieve this goal, we focus on two areas where we believe we can have the greatest impact: literacy and gender equality in education.  We work in collaboration with communities and local governments across Asia and Africa to develop literacy skills and a habit of reading among primary school children, and support girls to complete secondary school with the life skills they’ll need to succeed in school and beyond.
Our fundraising campaign consists of us buying good used books, in good quality for a good price and then reselling them at a slightly higher price ($1 each) and donating all profit to Room to Read.  It won't be enough to build a school but it may be enough to have a few books published in a native language (Room to Read helps set up publishers in the native countries with the additional benefit of added jobs and a boost in local economy.)

We will have a booth at the Excelsior Flea Market a few Saturdays this summer and will be sharing a garage and driveway next week (April 30-May 4) at the Maple Grove city-wide garage sales.

You can click on the following links to learn more:
Girl Rising Film Trailer
Girl Rising website
Room to Read
Our Room to Read campaign site, Wards for Words, can be found here. If you can't make it to our sales, please consider donating here.

No comments:

Post a Comment

Please leave a comment - thank you!