Volunteers from several clubs in Hawaii help collect and store books to ship to the Philippines.
By Charlene Santala Gearing, public relations chair, Rotary Club of Kapolei Sunset, Hawaii, USA
Are you familiar with the word serendipity? That certainly seems like what has happened for the Rotary Club of Kapolei Sunset, Hawaii.
We started the project to support libraries in the Philippines, but it has turned into a mission of hope and recovery for schools impacted by the devastation of Typhoon Haiyan. Our efforts coincided with Hawaii public schools replacing textbooks as they adapted to a changed curriculum.
A volunteer sorts and packs books.
To capitalize on this opportunity, what needed to happen was staggering. Thousands of books had to be picked up from dozens of schools across Oahu, stored in a warehouse, and then sorted and boxed for shipment to schools in the Philippines. The challenges were many: our club is small with only about fifteen members. We needed donated storage space, boxes, and a fork lift. And we needed dozens of volunteers.
Against all odds, our club made it happen, with the help of other Rotary clubs, local business partners and student volunteers! From the library project involving approximately 7,000 books, this project grew to include the collection, processing, and preparation for shipping of more than 45,000 books last year.
Our work is not done, we have just begun to support the recovery of schools in the Philippines. Book collections will continue; shipments will continue; and fundraising must continue! For more information about “Books 4 Kids,” go to our website.
Watch a news report on our project
Rotary Voices 
kudos on RI s sustained eradication programmes since 30 years!.For the first time according to ROTI reports there was no new polio case especially of the vaccine derived polio type since 6 weeks running now and far back beyond the endemic countries only the 2013 cases as at each month were the issue -polio is on the way to be wiped out of earth and certification of Nigeria & the whole planet is not impossible in 3 years time as technically planned by the END POLIO GAME …This is will be epidemiologically beautiful. Gbemisoye Tijani PHF D9125
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This is a rare help.A child can unlock the key to the world s treasury by active reading of books & related formats.The book shipping by the Warsaw Rotary Clubs in D3393 in response to the typhoon disaster in Phillipine is commendable & should be sustained by donors & clubs volunteering.Gbemisoye Tijani D9125,FEB 15 2015 Ibadan
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How about creating paperless / bookless, only verbal and practical education.
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That will be great and interiorly rewarding and kickstart real ingenuity in digital age kids .Rote learning will be reduced.More fundamental and applied research will be copius in the future of such kids.However it may not be realisable till policy back nup by government & interested experts back it up with effective but not killing supervision.Paperless & bookless education will inspire more independent learning than hitherto.Self discovery and education tailored towards the kid s bending and capabilities will be evident in his/her spooing drawings and web search or ‘creative nonsense’Thanks Galapakrishman
Gbemisoye Tijani,D9125
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Reblogged this on shanakyar.
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