Giving books - Seven places that wish your used books.
So you've got a pile of gently used picture books that your kids have long outgrown, or maybe it's that dusty logpile of current chick-lit by your bedside that you want to clear out. Here's a few ideas on how to donate those gently used books to a business that can get them into the hands of someone who's eager to be able to read them.
1. Local Charities
Donationtown is a great website that can help match you with a nearby charity. ?Just enter your zip code and look for a local group that will come to your house and pick up your donations. Not just for books, but clothes, toys, furniture, etc.
http://www.donationtown.org -- Enter your zip code and discover a local charity that will come and acquire your?donations.
Organizations like Goodwill and the Salvation Army will require books and sell them in their particular stores.
2. National Groups
These groups focus primarily on getting children's books into the hands of needy kids. BookEnds, a nonprofit organization based in Lower California, is about?Kids Helping Kids. BookEnds' recycles children's books through student-run book drives and places them in schools and youth organizations in need of books. Kids in Need, Books in Deed Kids in Need Books in Deed is a nonprofit organization that brings free textbooks and free author visits to Kids in Need through the entire state of Florida. Reading Tree Reading Tree places as well as maintains book collection bins in communities across the country. By collecting and redistributing used books, we are able to support literacy products by providing fundamental books to youngsters. Darien Book Aid Plan This?non-profit, all volunteer organization that builds any foundation of peace, understanding, and friendship by distributing free ebooks. Book Aid sends books in response to specific requests from Peace Corps volunteers, libraries and schools all over everything Books are also donated to libraries, prisons, hospitals, Native American and Appalachian groups in the nation.
Reader to Reader A?non-profit organization that distributes books to schools and libraries in need.
3. International Charities
The Book Bus - The Publication Bus Foundation was founded in 2007 by Tom Maschler with the goal of spreading literacy and the joy with reading to children in Zambia. The Book Bus now operates in Malawi and Ecuador and Zambia.
The Book Bus provides a portable service and actively promotes literacy in order to underprivileged communities in Zambia and Ecuador. The legacy of each Book Bus visit is often a reading corner and bookshelves stocked using children?s books. Book Aid International - This organization?increases access to books to support literacy, education and development in sub-Saharan Africa, Palestine and Sri Lanka. Books Abroad - Books Abroad feels that, in the long term, education is what is required to support solve the worlds problems. With the power to read as well as write, the children of today will employ a better understanding of the issues encircling them.
Nearly all types of books are accepted from the International Book Project, Inc. of Lexington, Kentucky. Although the International Book Project works mainly in developing countries, last year we also partnered with several organizations employed in underserved communities within the U. S. International Book Project - This international nonprofit whose mission would be to promote education and literacy while broadening Americans? understanding of their neighbors by sending quality made use of books overseas. Books for International Goodwill - Ebooks for International Goodwill (B. I. G.) has successfully recycled used books for productive use by those who need books for schools and libraries to boost literacy in developing communities all over the world. B. I. G. is a project begun by the Parole Rotary Club of Annapolis and is now an independent non-profit entity. It?s motto is ?Spreading Literacy by simply Keeping Books Alive.
4. Libraries.
Call your local library to find out when you can donate to them. ?Many libraries will take your books and sell them into their used book fund raisers.
5. Hospitals, nursing homes, and shelters. Hospitals and clinics frequently accept donations of books therefore to their waiting rooms and patients. ?I know from running book drives that nursing homes like to get romance novels and biographies. Also, there's a local family shelter in my area which is alway looking for teen/YA books therefore to their bigger kids. ?Find out what your local corporations need.
6. Prisons.
Until I started researching this content, it had never occurred to me to donate books on the corrections system. ?I know not everyone will concur, but I think this is an excellent idea. ?Take note that frequently they'll only accept paperback book donations.
Check out this map and click your state -- ?prison books programs throughout United states (Google map).
Specific programs.
Prison Book Program of Quincy, Massachusetts
Books to Prisoners of Seattle, Washington;
Books Through Bars of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Prison Book Project of Amherst, Massachusetts.
Women's Prison Book Project of Minneapolis, Minnesota.
Chicago Books to Women in Living hell.
7. Other great ideas.
Set them free! ?Book Crossing is a really fun idea. ?Go to Book Crossing's website to download their labels, create your own custom labels, or order labels from them after that fill it out, register your book online, then leave it in a public space and examine if anyone else registers it. http://www.bookcrossing.com Milk and Bookies A nationwide charitable organization that inspires children to provide back, using books as its currency. ?If your child has a birthday coming up and doesn't feel the need to receive 30+ new toys, then Milk and Bookies can show you how to host a party where your kid collects books for charities.
For more organizations and charities with a book/literacy focus in america and Canada, this is a very useful list on the Reading Tubs wiki page about Literacy Businesses. Also, the American Library Association has an useful list at Book Donation Programs.
Author Resource:
Writer and blogger, Lisa Dalesandro, writes the children?s literature blog thebookmama.com to help parents find fantastic things for their kids, big and little, to read. She also writes the blog How To Think Like a Skinny Chick at http://thinklikeaskinnychick.blogspot.com/
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