Providing Books to Children, Creating a More Successful Future!

Providing books to children, creating a more successful future!

February 2016

At Book it Forward! Idaho our mission is to collect gently-used and new children’s books and get them in the hands of kids who need them. We know that access to books is a key factor in becoming a proficient reader. Here are a few examples of the work we have done so far:

· We donated 4,000+ children’s books to South West District Health WIC clinics.

· We helped Caldwell’s P16 preschool class setup a lending library and we continue to stock it. We have provided book for each child to take home at graduation for the last 3 years.

· We have funded the building of 10 Little Libraries at Title One schools and stock them with books each month.

· We have “adopted” a few classrooms at Taft Elementary and are supplying books for their front office library.

· We donated 2,000+ books to the Nampa B&GC, for their teen after school club..

· We donated 15,000 to Terry Reilly Clinics waiting rooms.

· We donated thousands of books to Caldwell and Nampa schools.

· We donated 500+ books at Marion Pritchett High School for teen moms.

· We are funding the purchase of dual language books for various state-wide early learning programs.

Our operation is small but effective. We take pride in being a grass-roots initiative. We connect with people primarily by word of mouth and are very keen to create lasting relationships in the community.

To date we have:

· Collected and distributed approximately 100,000 books.

· Established relationships with, Bishop Kelly High School, Roosevelt, Riverstone International, Anser Charter School and Highlands Elementary schools as collection sites.

· We have 4 outdoor collection boxes located at the downtown Y and West Y, United Way of Treasure Valley, and the Idaho Non-Profit Center.

· Established relationships with The Y, Garfield Elementary, P16 Pre-school, Nampa B&GC, Little Libraries, Caldwell and Nampa schools, Taft Elementary, Terry Reilly Pediatric Clinics and the After School Network as donation sites.

· Established a “warehouse” operation on The Cabin’s premises to intake, process and send out the books.

The community understands our mission and has responded enthusiastically. In March of 2014 we were featured with Larry Gebert on his morning broadcast. We were broadcasted from The Cabin and were able to spread the word about our efforts and our mission. As follow-up we hosted reading events at local schools.

We have a PSA running on local radio stations, a Facebook page and work with other non-profits to collect books for children 0 – 18 years old. We were also awarded the 2015 grant from the Silver Sage Porsche Club of America. With these funds we will install additional outdoor collection boxes, build and stock 10 additional Little Libraries, and purchase dual language books for 0 – 8 years old.

We have a group of four people working on this project weekly with a resource advisory board of 4 people. We are fortunate to have the support and resources of both Idaho Voices for Children and The Cabin as well as casual volunteers to help clean and sort the books. We have a great mix of skills including legal, accounting and finance, public relations, literacy education, medical training and deep connections in the community.

We are keen to leverage any connections and aim to be responsive and quick in our follow up.

Our Team:

Terri Garabedian
Diane Schwarz / Pharmacist
CPA/Accounting
Julie Manning / Attorney
Lorie Nies Pettiette / Public Relations Consultant
Kathleen Harrington / L&D Nurse
Mary Jo Surges-Prokop / Literacy Education Specialist
Vicky Swerdloff
LeAnn Simmons / Community Volunteer
Former Executive Director of IVC

We are an Idaho Non-Profit corporation (EIN 82-0478703).