Books Reach Students in Soweto and Durban, South Africa
Last summer Books For Africa was pleased to host a group from the MN Orchestra at our Minnesota warehouse, where they helped unveil two beautiful "Nelson Mandela" Little Free Libraries for delivery to South Africa. Little Free Libraries produced these special LFLs in honor of the MN orchestra’s four city “Music for Mandela” South Africa tour, in celebration of Nelson Mandela’s centenary.
A container of 22,000 books was delivered to Soweto, South Africa, in partnership with The Minnesota Orchestra and The Butterfly Readers program, where they were shared among community organizations. The container was sponsored by Medtronic, Merck & Co., and Out of Print.
Thulani Madondo, Executive Director of the Kliptown Youth Program, shared a photo of some of the students in the Kliptown community, excited about their new books!
A container of 22,000 books and computers was also delivered to Durban, South Africa, in partnership with The Web Foundation and UR Global. This shipment was sponsored by Stan Trollip and the Detective Kubu reader community, Merck & Co., The Sage Foundation, and Out of Print.
Ntokozo Ndlovu, CEO & Founder of The Web Foundation, reported back “On behalf of The Web Foundation and Siyafunda donate a book team; I just want to pass my gratitude to you for the donation of the brilliant books Books For Africa donated towards Siyafunda this year. We have been able to donate more than 10 000 books to 7 rural schools in five provinces this year and started our first e-library at Sehloi Primary School, in Limpopo, with 8 laptop fully loaded with Book Dash children’s books. The aim is to transform these rural schools into self-reliant life-long learning institutions and create the state of the art libraries in rural primary schools.”
"Today I proudly rocked my @booksforAfrica t-shirt. I'm over the moon to receive notification that a container from the USA with books for different grades for my community has just shipped for arrival early November in South Africa ...! May no rural child be left behind we talking literacy we talking digital we talking education! THANK YOU BOOKS FOR AFRICA FOR PARTNERING WITH US. We aim to help transform rural communities socially and economically bridging the existing gap between them and the global community."
--Luleka Mkuzo, Founder, UR Global, and 2018 Mandela Fellow (pictured above)
Partner organizations such as Kliptown Youth Program, The Butterfly Readers, The Web Foundation and UR Global help develop a culture of literacy, empowering students to continue their education and pursue their interests. BFA is proud to be a part of these wonderful projects, and we are committed to supplying books to students in South Africa. Stay tuned for reports on two more containers to Elsey's River and Khayelitsha Townships in the Cape Town region.