Books for Africa Read-a-Thon

An exciting addition to our fundraising this year was our “Read-A-Thon!” Through the University of Washington Pipeline Project, a middle-school student from the Seattle Girl's School was identified who was interested in doing a community service project, and she decided to hold a read-a-thon for the girls in grades 5-7. Students solicited sponsorship from parents and neighbors to support “Books for Africa”, and in turn, the students agreed to read a certain number of books, or for a certain amount of time. The girls raised over $900.00 in two weeks, and this amazing student is eager to do the project again!

Here is the story: As part of its seventh grade curriculum, Seattle Girl's School has a “Pay It Forward” culminating event each year. Each student is encouraged to showcase something that they're passionate about, something where they can and have made a difference. Three core teachers work together with individual students to choose something meaningful to them. Student Lisa Been chose to work with our “Books for Africa” team and help to promote literacy and education, two things she feels strongly about. 25 of Lisa's friends joined her, reading over 30,000 minutes together and raising over $900 through pledges to help with shipping costs for the Books for Africa 2005 collection. What a great idea, very simple yet meaningful, supportive and very necessary for the Africa project. Lisa plans to do this again next year, with additional schools involved and more teachers too. She will contact us for help and of course, we will be there to lend any assistance we can. Great work, Lisa! We're so proud of you for thinking of others and making a real difference to children so many miles away.

This is Lisa Been from SGS.
Here are some comments from her and other students:

“It's cool to know my reading is helping other kids read.” Amalia 5th grade

“Pay it Forward gives me a way to give back to communities and make a positive impact on the world” Zoe 7th grade

“You can still do huge things and wear, I don't know, size 12 kids. You don't have to wear big shoes, to fill big shoes.” Sarah, Mona's Children

“Out of all of the amazing things I've done at SGS, the best are the ones where I know I'm helping someone else.” Lisa, 7th grade

The read-a-thon was for all of the grades, but the 5th and 6th grade participated most. She wants to try and do another read-a-thon next year and get more teacher support and even more participation.

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