Let’s Help Build A Library in Vietnam!

By Neal 

Over the weekend, I was forwarded an email from Julie Bennett, an acquisitions manager at Ten Speed Press, in which she shares the story of her volunteer work with Room to Read, a philanthropic foundation created by John Wood, the former Microsoft exec who left the company to build schools and libraries in rural communities throughout Asia and Africa. (You may recall hearing about him last year, when HarperCollins published Leaving Microsoft to Change the World.) When Bennett heard Wood speak at the non-profit’s annual fundraiser, she told her readers, “I… was blown away by how much his organization accomplishes with relatively small amounts of money—roughly $250 to educate a girl for an entire year, and about $10,000 to construct a library AND fill it with books, puzzles, games, and furniture.”

That inspired her to create her own fundraising venture within Room to Read’s larger infrastructure, and now she’s hoping to inspire others to contribute enough to build a library in Vietnam and provide it with enough resources to cover the first three years of operation. It’s easy for you to get involved:

“Go to http://www.roomtoread.org/involvement/donate.html and make a donation (big, small, or otherwise). In the ‘Special Instructions’ portion of the online or mail-in form (and in the memo section of your check, if donating that way), please write ‘Julie Bennett’s Build-a-Library Project’ so the donation gets applied to our library.”

You can also send new children’s books directly to Bennett to be added to the donation being put together by Ten Speed’s children’s imprint, Tricycle Press. Or you could join a roster of publishers that includes Scholastic, Chronicle, HarperCollins, McGraw-Hill, Pearson, and Reader’s Digest who have already established their own donation cycles with Room to Read. “Once we’ve raised this money,” Bennett promises, “Room to Read will send me updates on the construction of our library, including photos, which I’ll share with everyone.” I’ll look forward to running one of those pictures on my blog.