Updated Website

Our website, www.librarybuild.org, has been updated with new information and pictures about Rowen Elementary. Check it out!

Introducing Rowen Elementary

- Location: North Philadelphia, a little west of Broad Street
- Numbers: about 470 students
- Grades: K - 5
- Academics: Rowen has made AYP (Adequate Yearly Progress, the national standard for improving schools) the last two academic years!
- Breakdown: 95% are African American, 2.6% are white, and 1.5% are Latino (the rest are "other")
- Special Education: 11.8% of students are in some form of special education
- Economics: 82.8% of the students at Rowen are "economically disadvantaged" (according to School District standards), and 17.2% are "other". The entire school is Title 1.

We have a school!

Today was a great day for Library Build. First, Library Build is one of Whole Foods Callowhill's Nickels for Nonprofits, which means customers can donate their bag refunds to Library Build! So bring in your bags when you go shopping! I went in today and did a short little interview about Library Build. Not so sure that I will win for any prizes for interviewing or speech-giving skills, but at least word will get out :) We are also making plans to do a book drive for Library Build at Whole Foods - amazing! Keep an eye out, we hope to get it started soon!

Second, and the best news ever. We officially have a school! William Rowen Elementary School in NW Philadelphia. I have been working with them for about a year now, but because of different issues, its been hard to pin down any sort of agreement. Well, I met the new principal today, and we are going for it. The new principal is ready to make a change for the better for his new students, and is very excited to be working with us!

First picture of Rowen's library. 

I will put together a summary/profile of Rowen for another blog post, so for now let me just discuss the library itself. As you can see from the picture above - they have a library!!! However, it is old, musty (very musty!), the furniture is old/broken, and the books themselves are all yellow with age. Most of the books are about 10 to 25 years old. They have a set of encyclopedias that are from 1986. Obviously they aren't useful!!

The library itself is fairly small, but at least its not cluttered!

The great thing about this library is that we will be able to go through the existing collection to see what is salvageable, giving Library Build a good head start.
The other awesome fact about Rowen School is that they have an amazing collection of Mac computers that were donated only a few years ago, so all of our money can go to books, kindles, nooks, and renovations!

The librarian's (eventual) corner

I will post more pictures with the profile of the school, so keep an eye out! Some great things are happening for Library Build, and for Rowen!

July 2011 Update

A few updates today:
- About this time last year I was able to connect with a school in Philadelphia that was interested in Library Build. Unfortunately, the situation got complicated when the district sent along paperwork that was too overwhelming for LB at that point. Fast forward to now, and I am working steadily through it. Which means that hopefully we can officially announce a partnership soon.
- Grant applications have been taking up a lot of time recently. In March and April of this year I had completed about 8-10 applications (also including just general letters of inquiry). Not surprisingly, LB was rejected from all of them. The state of funding right now is a mess because of the economy. Grant programs and grant-giving organizations even in good times usually only like to fund projects that they have funded before, and in hard times like these, a new nonprofit has no shot. Hopefully we can interest at least one grant-giving organization though, and really get the ball rolling!
- The government likes paperwork, and even the service orgs within the government are no different! Currently working to partner with AmeriCorps for the Library Fellows program - if I can make it through the paperwork rounds!
- I have been on an intense search for volunteers. Anyone and everyone interested is more than welcome - even if you don't live in Philly! I am trying to develop the following:

• Fundraising plans that do not involve applying to grant programs (so far this has involved contacting local bookstores about book fairs, obviously I am open to any other ideas).
• Marketing materials for Library Fellows, partner schools, the media, etc etc.
• Grant writing, or just grant reading. Like to proofread?
• Anything and everything! 

In closing, here's a link to a recent article in the Philadelphia Inquirer about summer library programs, and the danger in the summer "slide" when many students regress academically because of lack of books, summer academic camps, etc.
Also, a point from his article about why the library is important to our students NOW: "More than 500,000 Philadelphia adults have limited reading ability."

http://www.philly.com/philly/columnists/david_brown/20110614_Turning_reluctant_readers_into_eager_ones_at_Free_Library.html

Social Innovations Journal

Forever ago I was interviewed by the Philadelphia Social Innovations Journal about Library Build, and finally, here is the article!

http://www.philasocialinnovations.org/site/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=243:nominated-library-build&catid=41:nominated-innovations&Itemid=89

Nickels for Nonprofits

Who knew that keeping a blog would be so much work? Obviously, I have a lot of updates on Library Build, Inc which I will be writing about in the next few days.

Right now though, I want to let everyone who is in Philadelphia know that we were selected to be one of Whole Foods Callowhill's Nickels for Nonprofits recipients! You can donate your bag refund to Library Build now until September.


Also, look for word about a possible book drive there as well.


Callie

Months later...

I hadn't realized that we had been away from this blog for so long. We have had a series of unfortunate events with Library Build recently that have been very disheartening. We received confirmation that a principal at a Philadelphia school was ready and willing to work with us, however the next step is to work with the District itself. We are currently sifting through very complicated paperwork, etc, most of which is above and beyond what Library Build can agree to (insurance needs, work agreements, you name it). In the meantime, we are working on different ways that we can transform our message and organization to do what we can in Philadelphia. Any thoughts, ideas, support, let us know!

Callie
calliehammond@librarybuild.org