Libraries invited to participate in collecting funds for Book Wish Foundation to build libraries in Darfuri refugee camps

The New Jersey State Library is encouraging all public and school libraries to participate in a statewide campaign through the State Library from March 15 – April 15, 2012, to collect money for Book Wish Foundation. The Foundation is working with the UN Refugee Agency (UNHCR) to build libraries in Darfuri refugee camps in Eastern Chad in Africa, where an estimated 285,000 Sudanese refugees live without access to libraries.

Book Wish Foundation (www.bookwish.org) is an all-volunteer 501 (c) (3) public charity providing high-impact reading aid for people in crisis; currently focused on refugees from Darfur. Created in 2007 by a mother-son team in response to a Washington Post article about the lack of books in a Darfuri refugee camp in Chad, Book Wish has provided requested books, reading glasses, and solar-rechargeable lighting to the refugees.

The New Jersey State Library encourages New Jersey school and public libraries to join this campaign:

•Let the State Library know that you are participating. Contact Sharon Rawlins at srawlins@njstatelib.org or Gary Cooper at gcooper@njstatelib.org.

• Design a creative donation container and send in pictures for posting on the State Library website. Either post the photos to your Flickr account and send Gary Cooper the link or send us the digital photos and he’ll post them for you. (gcooper@njstatelib.org)

• The libraries collecting the most money will be recognized at the end of the campaign.

To be eligible for this contest, libraries should collect the money, make a check made out to “New Jersey State Library” and send the check to the State Library by May 1, 2012.

Send your check to:
Sheri Shafer, Chief Financial Officer
NJ State Library
PO Box 520
Trenton, NJ 08625-0520

Checks must be received at the State Library by May 1, 2012.

Contact for Libraries: Sharon Rawlins email: srawlins@njstatelib.org.

Book Wish Foundation also organized a short story collection written by renowned children’s and teen authors, that was published in September 2011 called What You Wish For: Stories and Poems for Darfur. Proceeds of the sale of the book will go to the UNHCR to help develop libraries in the refugee camps. You can purchase the book from Better World Books (www.betterworldbooks.com). The company gives a portion of their proceeds to literacy charities and has agreed to donate all the profits from the book to Book Wish Foundation.

What You Wish For includes stories by talented and well-known award-winning authors such as John Green, Karen Hesse, Marilyn Nelson, Joyce Carol Oates, Francisco X. Stork, Cynthia Voigt, Jane Yolen, Meg Cabot, Jeanne DuPrau, Cornelia Funke, Nikki Giovanni, Ann M. Martin, Alexander McCall Smith, Naomi Shihab Nye, Nate Powell, Sofia Quintero, Gary Soto, and R. L. Stine, with a foreword by Mia Farrow.