Here's a note that's been languishing in our inbox for far too long. From accomplished writer and salsa dancer, Julianna Baggot:
The Book Box Project: getting books to kids who need them most
About a month ago I got an email from the Department of Corrections, to call a specific officer, as soon as possible. I was at first a little panic-stricken and immediately indignant. I was pretty sure that I'd been wrongly accused, but would end up paying a hefty fine regardless. (I'm a guilty indignant pessimist.)
The officer, it turns out, wanted — of all things — books. He wanted them for kids with incarcerated parents. While waiting to see a parent in prison, you can't have games or toys, but you can have books. Why not provide them, and, all the better, why not a book the kids can start and take home? The officer was contacting me in my role as cofounder of a nonprofit that gets free books to kids who need them most: Kids in Need - Books in Deed -- www.booksindeed.org. The program is housed at the FSU Foundation, and for almost a year we've been working to get books into the homes of kids in Title I schools, shelters, as well as underprivileged mothers-to-be, to under-funded libraries, and now prisons and the foster care system.
The Book Box Project is something we've set up through Kids in Need— Books in Deed.
It's simple.
Get a cardboard box, put it in your office, school, church, front stoop, or at the doorway of your next party. Let us know that you're collecting, and we'll send you an email that you can then forward to your friends and coworkers. Have everyone pitch in to fill the box with new and slightly used books for children. We'll give you a list of organizations to choose from (shelters, Title I schools, prisons, and foster care in the state of Florida — home to some of the poorest counties in the country). Once the box is full, you can ship it directly to the organization in need.
That's it.
Think about it and get in touch if you have any questions. We'd love to partner with you on this!
Please feel free to forward this on ...
For straight monetary donations: please send checks to:
Kids in Need – Books in Deed
Attn: Nancy Smilowitz
Senior Director of Development
Office of the Dean College of Arts & Sciences
Tallahassee, FL 32306-1280
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