Books for Botswana

My primary assignment area as a Peace Corps Volunteer (PCV) is the Red Cross, however my secondary assignment area is at the schools in my town. As a result, a lot of the work that I do in my service involves the schools. There are three schools in my village, two primary schools (elementary schools) and a junior secondary school (middle school, also called a J.S.S.). The two primary schools have about 600 students at them. The junior school has about 1,200 students.

My work with the two primary schools has been limited, and mainly my interactions with the students have been through Red Cross presentations for the Month of Youth Against HIV. However, I also participated in something called Books for Botswana, an American NGO that works to deliver books to schools in Botswana. The books are collected via donations in America, but shipped through donations to Africa.

The second of the primary schools is far away from the library in my town, and has no library of its own. As a result, when I received the email from a fellow PCV about schools needing books, I immediately signed my school up.  After a few months, the books finally came.

My school got 18 boxes of books, and each box contained 70-100 books for elementary school children. It was wonderful. Because the school has no library, the books were sorted by grade level, and distributed to the individual classrooms. The classrooms have no bookshelves, but I am hoping to work with the school PTA and find funds to build bookshelves for the books. My school actually received so many books that they couldn’t fit them all in the classrooms, and some had to be stored in the computer lab! 

Students opening the boxes of books.

Sorting the books.

 When we were sorting the books, it was surreal seeing books that I had grown up with that were such a huge part of my childhood.  Books like the Velveteen Rabbit, the Berenstain Bears, Charlotte’s Web, Norma Jean, Jumping Bean, and A Porcupine Named Fluffy. The students were excited when they were looking at the books, and kept getting distracted staring at the pictures.

Some very excited students and teachers!

Students reading the books!

Giving my school these books is one of the projects that I am proudest of since starting my Peace Corps service. As a younger child and teen, I wasn’t allowed to watch TV. As a result, the books I read and the fantasy worlds that they created shaped my childhood. I used to read Harry Potter and imagine what it would be like to use magic and be accepted into Hogwarts. I used to dream about solving mysteries with Nancy Drew. And I used pretend that I was off fighting battles with Aragorn and Legolas in the Lord of the Rings trilogies.  Because of the lack of access to reading materials, children in my town don’t know what it is like to loose yourself in book, exploring a different world for an afternoon. They don’t understand the joy of reading a book, the excitement it can bring to a dull day. And they don’t understand the support and feeling of togetherness and hope that reading a book can bring to a difficult time in your life. Giving children access to books is such an important part of who I am, and what I value, and I am so grateful that I get to share the world of books with them.