International Literacy Projects
You may have been searching for an idea for suggesting an international project to your clubss. Following is the first of three for your consideration -- a project in Ghana with our own John Donnelly, Old Saybrook and working in Ghana.
Ghana Literacy Project by John Donnelly
As you probably know the cost of shipping is the big impediment to book projects. John Donnelly, Old Saybrook Club, visits Ghana once or twice a year. He works with a school in Techiman with about 300 students. As part of a fundraiser for the school, he and any other volunteers who help out at the school bring back as many books as possible upon returning to the US. These books are in English and are for children under the age of say 7 or 8. The books tell of African folklore and customs. The books cost between 3 and 5 dollars there and I sell them for $ 20. I also bring as many books that I've collected with me on my trips there. I bring some texts as well as children's storybooks, alphabet books, numbers books, etc.
The Rotary club of Tema, which is a port city, receives books from the US through Books for Africa I believe. John has a contact there. They keep these books in a warehouse they own. He believes they use college students and club members to categorize the books and stack them. Schoolmasters and the like come to the warehouse to make a selection of books for their school and the club may charge a small fee or it's just implied. They've been doing the project for many years.
John has recently made a contact with some young girls that have started an organization to collect and distribute used uniforms they collect from private and parochial schools. One of our members was able to get them a great deal on shipping a container monthly out of Boston. They will be shipping to Zambia and there will be room in the container for more materials. I'm not sure if books will raise the price because of the weight.
Project Contact Information: John W. Donnelly, CPA, CFP l Tel: 860-399-9499 l FAX: 860-399-6207
Liberia Literacy Project (District 7640)
I’m working on an International Dictionary Project. It’s in a “test” stage of delivering dictionaries to the United Methodist’s Operation Classroom with the help of the Monrovia, Liberia, Rotary Club. As we deliver dictionaries to third grade readers locally, this is similar. With pictures and “thank you notes from the children” we know there’s success.
The next step is to get a “package” of a dictionary, pencils, a ball point pen, and two pads of paper in a heavy (6 mil) duty reclosable plastic bag. These would be handed out to about a 1,000 households in Monrovia. If that goes well, deliver and distribute 100,000 then the rest of the country, a total of about a million packages.
Project Contact Information: Steve Novack l Rotary Club of Haddonfield, NJ l H: 856-751-6796 W: 856-751-8249
Guatemala Literacy Project (District 92308)
Are Rotarians in your club interested in working with an international literacy project? Would you like to be involved in a project that makes a significant difference in the lives of children and families? Is a literacy project with a proven success record and one that is managed to maximize a club’s initial support so that the project is sustainable in perpetuity without additional financial support of interest to Rotarians in your club? Then the Guatemala Literacy Project may be just the literacy project you seek.
The Guatemala Literacy Project (GLP) is a partnership of the North American & Guatemala Rotary Clubs and the Cooperative for Education. For the past 12 years, the GLP has provided textbooks to secondary schools in rural villages of Guatemala. This project has involved over 330 contributing Rotary clubs from across North America and in Guatemala.
The GLP promotes lifelong reading and writing skills in Guatemala by providing badly-needed textbooks, library materials, and computers to impoverished schools. The goal of GLP is to ensure that no child in Guatemala grows up without the gift of both traditional and technological literacy. Its mission, “Breaking the cycle of poverty through education” is achieved by providing resources and a means for each school and pueblo to continue providing books for its students.
Guatemala is one of the poorest in income and literacy in the Western hemisphere. People in the rural areas of Guatemala attend school for an average of four years. Women have an average of less than two years of schooling. A contributing factor to the literacy crisis is the near absence of reading materials. Over 90% of rural schools lack textbooks or library books, let alone having access to computers. Guatemalan schoolchildren who are able to complete the 8th grade often do so without the skills needed to get good jobs and break the cycle of poverty.
The Guatemala Literacy Project is helping combat this problem by matching Rotary Clubs in North America with the needy schools in Guatemala. These clubs donate funds to purchase textbooks, library materials, and /or computers. 100% of the GLP donations go directly to support the project.
The GLP textbook and computer programs are self-sustaining. A rental program is set up in each school in which students pay the school a small fee to use a set of four textbooks for the year. This creates a fund, managed by the GLP, for replacing the books as they wear out and guarantees that the program started with the Rotarians’ seed money will survive in perpetuity. A similar fee-based program supports the computer lab program. The results are very rewarding. To date, the GLP supports 170 textbook school projects and 29 computer centers. 31,991 students currently use textbooks provided by the project and 12,300 students are learning with GLP computers.
Rotarians who are interested in actively participating in the GLP are invited to participate in one of the textbook delivery tours. These ten-day tours occur in February (the beginning of the school year in Guatemala). It is an opportunity to see how the project works, meet the CoEd staff who administers the project, see the beautiful country of Guatemala, and meet the students and families the project benefits. It is an excellent opportunity to meet and travel with other Rotarians who are committed to helping Guatemalan people help themselves through the gift of literacy.
If your club is interested in learning more about this project, contact Carolyn Johnson, Literacy Resource Coordinator, Rotary District 7780. Carolyn is a veteran of 5 textbook delivery tours and is currently working with the GLP to develop a new initiative to provide quality literature and teacher training at the elementary school level. She is happy to talk with you and is available to speak to your club about the GLP and how your club might become involved.
For more information, visit web site www.guatemalaliteracy.com
Haiti Book Project with Connecticut Rotary (October, 2008)
As you know we have signed the Agreement with the Mayor's office, have ordered the books and have received delivery of over 26,000 books so far (out of maybe 30,000 total). We have been able to reach this higher number of books because a) the Government had subsidized a good portion of the school books in the program and b) because the publisher has agreed to give us an additional discount to support the Rotary Club of Petion-Ville, as he is aware of our different actions.
After receiving the books in the warehouse (free storage offered by one of our members Philippe Victor Chatelain), we had to organize them:
- sort them by classes and by schools
- put a stamp ("Donated by Rotary" + spaces for school names and name of student loaning the book, dates, etc..) in every single book
- repack them.
For this we got the help of the school directors as well as spouses and kids of Rotarians. We have been able to do 3 schools (out of 15) in a full day's work and have so far worked 4 days on this, we are very closed to be done with the sorting.
Only schools that have already installed the shelving for the schools are receiving the books. The shelves are part of the agreement with the Mayor's office which is providing them to the schools.
This morning delivery was done to 2 schools. (We don't want to just give the books to the Mayor's office, we want to go along with them and supervise delivery to each school). The pictures of the deliveries will be posted later.
In the meantime, please visit the Album containing the signature ceremony, the sorting procedure and also the installation of school crossing signs. http://rotarypvalbum.fotopic.net/c1589664.html
You may also look at the album containing some of the pictures of our disaster Relief interventions: http://rotarypvalbum.fotopic.net/c1584839.html
