Bibliphiles of America, BOOKS-A-GO GO, Inc.
People were not aware that so many children lacked books at home. The few books we initially gave to the children showed us how desperate children were for books. As we shared this experiance with others, we received boxes and bags of books from people who wanted to help these children, while clearing off their children's book shelves of books no longer being used.
Book drives yielded hundreds of children's books for the students of West Jacksonville (West Jax) Elementary School. These children were from low income families, and many of them had never owned a book before. We were overwhelmed at the response of the children. The impact of the donated books at West Jacksonville Elementary School was great. The children loved owning books and the teachers were happy to see the children have books at home.
There were requests from the principals of other schools with low income students for books. Over 30,000 elementary school students are from low income families in Duval County (Jacksonville Fl).
Betty Metz (Chairman of West Jax School Advisory Council), Kathy Witsell ( Resident Faculty for University of North Florida), and David Holtry (Sales Manager for DriveTime in Jacksonville) got together to discuss these requests. We knew that there were thousands of children's books that were no longer being used, and thousands of children who need and want them.
We decided to conduct a community wide book drive in Jacksonville Florida to collect used books and give them to these children. DriveTime had 4 drop off locations, and the UNF interns would sort and distribute the books. Why not, what did we have to loose?
We were all about to embark on a most incredible journey with BOOKS-A-GO GO....
We decided on a month long campaign. BOOKS-A-GO GO received newspaper publicity, television, and radio interviews, and the books started pouring in. The Jacksonville Children's Commission (part of a children's literacy program of Jacksonville Mayon John Peyton) asked to join our effort and donated thousands of books to BOOKS-A-GO GO. The Friends of the Jacksonville Library also gave BOOKS-A-GO GO thousands of books.
The stream of donated books have never stopped. Tens of thousands of books have been distributed to children in need.
With the support of many involved in this effort, we knew we could do so much more for children in need if we were a 501c3 nonprofit organization.
Bibliophiles of America, BOOKS-A-GO GO Inc. incorporated as a 501c3 nonprofit organization.
Although, BOOKS-A-GO GO was helping the situation of lack of books for children in need in Jacksonville, we we approached by others who wanted to get books for the children in need in their cities.
In March, 2008 BOOKS-A-GO GO continued to partner with DriveTime, and had a national campaign. Tens of thousands of books were collected and given to children throughout the country.
Our March 2009 campaign to included 67 cities with DriveTime and other organizations in other cities. We welcome inquiries on how to include your city in our March 2001 National Book Drive.
BOOKS-A-Go Go has been approached to help get books overseas to children who need them. We have been able to work with organizations and have sent Spanish books that have gone to children in need in Costa Rica, Mexico and the Dominican Republic. Books have also gone to Taiwan. We are working on getting books to India and Malaysia. PLease contact us for more information, or if you can help.
