Our small shipments are an excellent example of how something small can make a great impact. We may never fully know the effect a book has on a person, but the smiles on our partners’ faces give us a glimpse of a book’s true power.

Our small shipments are small because every book is hand selected by our staff and volunteers to fit the partner’s needs. A small shipment can be sent anywhere in the world with a valid postal address. So whether it’s going to “the house behind the big tree” or to a rural school in Mozambique, these books can travel anywhere and to any partner.

Child Impact International is one of many organizations that witnessed our small shipment’s impact first hand.  Child Impact International desires to see all children, especially those from rural and impoverished areas of Ghana receive access to educational materials.

We recently received a letter of thanks for a small shipment from Child Impact International that we would like to share with you.

“We at Child Impact International are continually inspired by the dedication and generosity of donors like yourself who answer the call to give again and again. It is our hope that this simple letter will help to communicate our very big thanks for your generosity. Your support has played a key role in our success in reducing illiteracy in our nation. There is no way to fully express our gratitude for your loyalty.”

You can help us make a big impact by funding a small shipment. Each small shipment we send costs $200, which is a small price to pay to send a classroom set of textbooks, or help a rural school start their first library.

Together, we can do smalls things in a great way. Here’s how you can help.

The post #MLKDay: Doing Small Things in a Great Way appeared first on IBP.

Recently, the International Book Project was contacted by a group of women from the Okoijorogu Village in Delta State, Nigeria. This group of women call themselves the “Delta Women” and they formed in order to reach out and try to better their community. There is no school in the village of Okoijorogu. The closest school is actually almost 2.5 miles away in a neighboring village. Each day the children in the village wake up and make this walk to a school that is far away, small, and has no chairs. The children brave bad weather, difficult terrain, and have to cross the Benin/Sapele Express Road on the way to the neighboring village. This road is a hub for traffic and construction and obviously poses a threat to the safety of the students.

Knowing that these children walked this path every day for 190 days out of the year so that they could get their education is both humbling and inspiring. As someone who has, at times, taken their education for granted I realize how much my education has helped me grow and learn. I am going to graduate from college this May and I feel as if my education has shaped me as a person and will continue to support me in my future. Everyone should be given the opportunity to receive their education and it is a hard realization to find that many do not have this option.

The Delta Women recognized this concern and decided to reach out in hopes of building a school in their village. In January of 2013 the State Governor, Dr. Emmanuel Uduaghan gave them approval for the construction of a nursery and primary school, which began the following August. With a new school a much shorter distance away, they contacted us to request books to stock their school and give the children a chance to have better accessibility to education.

We would love to see this library stocked today but in order for that to happen, we are going to need a lot of help. Just $10 will give 10 books to start this library.

So I must ask, what is an education worth?

Here is how you can help us stock the library today  http://bit.ly/1nVxCdn

written by Taylor Maupin

The post What is an education worth? appeared first on IBP.

Over the next two years, I traveled to Ghana, West Africa, on three separate occasions for up to two weeks at a time. I made some wonderful friends in the process, spent time at the US Embassy in Accra, helped write a US State Department Grant, and coordinated fundraising and marketing events stateside.

I also fell in love with the children I met in Ghana, and will never forget one small girl named Doris pulling me aside on my first night in the city of Tema to read to me. We sat together on the floor in a hot corner of a hallway and she tentatively uncurled her fingers to reveal a crumpled and worn pamphlet. She crawled into my lap and insisted, “I am small, but I can read. Listen, Mama Susan.”

Doris in 2010

For the next ten minutes she read a tattered and dirty VCR instruction manual to me aloud, in English. The group home where she lived—a safe haven that provided food, shelter, love and her education, had very few books, if any. They’d been lost, she told me, or destroyed. She shrugged, and shook her head. “No books. Only at school, and there, not many.”

I was jetlagged, exhausted, and moved to tears by her earnestness, but knew one thing in those quiet moments with her warm body nestled into my arms: learning is a gift. Reading—something I had taken for granted my entire life, was a privilege.

Two years later, when I left the non-profit world to work full-time as a writer, I knew I was making a leap into the unknown. At the same time I knew that my love for writing was inextricably linked to my love for reading. I remembered Doris, sitting in my lap on that sweltering night in 2010. Reading is a gift. And I knew that somehow, I could still do something to help.

The only problem was that I didn’t have any money. What did I have to give? I pushed the idea aside. 

Yet the thought of sending books to Ghana wouldn’t let go of me. I began researching non-profits working to provide books internationally, and was thrilled to find the International Book Project in Lexington, Kentucky, thirty miles from my hometown. Here was an organization that could send a library to children like Doris.

I made phone calls, introducing myself. I visited IBP at their warehouse on Delaware Avenue. And even though I live in Texas, I committed to raising enough money to send “a library’s worth” of books—a full pallet— to Doris and many other children just like her.

I had no idea how I was going to fund it.

Doris in 2014

It’s been almost two years since I made that initial commitment, and I found a way to collect and deliver children’s books to IBP. I also raised the money to ship those books to Ghana. And after that, I shipped another library, and then another: over 5000 books in less than two years. Because of that little VCR manual, not only Doris but many others now have access to books, every day.

Want to help? I’m currently funding my fourth library—this one to go to Nigeria. Let IBP know you’re giving to one of Susan’s Projects and they’ll make sure your donation is well spent. Or better yet, start your own fundraising project with IBP. Contact them today to find out how.

 

Susan Ishmael-Poulos is a friend of the International Book Project as well as a long-time supporter of our book sending mission that currently resides in Texas.

Are you a volunteer or donor? We’d love to hear from you! Please contact Chassity Neckers at chassity@intlbookproject.

The post A Donor’s Heart: Susan Poulos appeared first on IBP.

However, what I love more are stories about others who love books and how fellow book lovers can inspire a culture of reading no matter where they are.  As I have come to learn during my time at the International Book Project,  a love of reading provides hope and a future where one is not always possible.

Recently, the  International Book Project sent more than 2,000 books to help promote a habit of reading through a book fair in Ghana. Children were invited to come to the book fair and select books for their own personal collection. What a great way to foster a love of reading!

The students were overjoyed to receive a book of their very own – this is a true treasure in Ghana.

“The kids were so excited that they got to pick a stack of books out and take them back to their rooms. They were all writing their names on the inside cover because they loved having ownership,” said Touch a Life’s Pam Cope.

Wisdom who received a book about a surgeon held up his book with pride and said,  “I am going to be a surgeon someday and help people.”

These are just a few words from our friends at Touch a Life Foundation that inspire us every day.  Read their blog post here.

Photo Credit: Touch a Life Foundation

by Chassity Neckers

The post For the Love of Reading: Ghana Book Fair appeared first on IBP.