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Larry drove the van two hours to William Paterson University of New Jersey to give 5000 books away to soon-to-graduate teachers. The University made a nominal donation to defray the cost of the books and transportation. Are you a teacher who had to forage through Goodwill's shelves, paying a couple dollars per book for your classroom library? Or did you have to pounce on books at yard sales and library book sales? The new generation doesn't have to do this! Founded by a high school English teacher, BookSmiles makes teachers' lives easier, providing as many books as a teacher can carry away. When we're not distributing at teaching colleges, we open the Book Bank every Sunday morning and Wednesday afternoon for teachers to browse.A $35 yearly donation allows entry to the Book Bank all year long. Register here: BookSmiles.org But it takes a department head to initiate something like this. Thanks for inviting us Professor Margaret Renn!   Larry and Margaret Renn - Director William Paterson's office of Field Experiences
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Food rescue organizations like Sharing Excess do more critical work than we do at BookSmiles. What can be more important than feeding a hungry child? How can one read and learn on an empty stomach? But we break the cycle of intergenerational poverty in ways our food bank partners cannot. Providing immediate access to quality books for babies in cradles gives children a chance to read their way to a better life. Books are the physical stepping stones to academic success, which builds a stronger workforce. Research shows that people who use food banks and pantries have much lower literacy levels than those who regularly shop Trader Joes and Whole Foods. This is why we're so glad to work with our friends at Sharing Excess, providing TONS of quality children's books that get dispensed with TONS of food. BookSmiles Director of Development Emily Loughlin (far left) and I enjoyed mingling with Emily Doris and Olivia S. Molina at The Campbell's Company last week. If you've read this far, learn how you can help with our mission: booksmiles.org  What happens to weeded books from colleges and universities? We know that BookSmiles is the best place for books culled from library collections. We trade several tons of adult books each week for several tons of quality kids books. What a pleasure visiting the Gitenstein Library to collect outdated books to fuel our mission. We went in with our BookSmiles truck and extracted over 3000 books. Watch carefully as our estate-library program starts serving higher education. Do you have an estate library to donate? Or how about books from a college library. Please contact [email protected].  Here is our Carter Fichter, our Estate Manager.
 It's been a very busy December as we approach our 4,000,000th book distributed. And what a pleasure to spread book-joy with new friends, David Adelman and Rahim and Tanisha Thompson of the Thompson Family Foundation. 
A few days before, Larry and Emily had a great time distributing books at the Philadelphia Episcopal Cathedral, in parallel with a coat giveaway by the Jewish Family and Children’s Service of Greater Philadelphia. The Jalen Hurts Foundation purchased beautiful coats, and it was so great meeting Bree Hurts. Thanks for the invite, Justin and Rachel Fishman!
Tigris Foundation broke a record! They coordinated a POWERFUL drive that filled our truck TWICE in one day - harvesting 14 overloaded pallets of grown-up and kids books - about 16,000 total. They made it into a dynamic community event, harnessing the help of elected officials, neighbors, and the host - Upper Dublin Lutheran Church. We will trade adult books for their weight/bulk in used kids books. We encourage faith-based communities to across NJ and the Philly region to stage similar book drives. On a beautiful fall Sunday, 226 runners and walkers came out for our 3rd Annual 5K. We raised $25,000, so a big shout out to our sponsors, vendors, volunteers, and supporters.
Princeton takes books and education very seriously. That's why we're thrilled that Littlebrook Elementary has created a collection station for kids and grown-up books. Today Larry explained to first graders that they can now share their books with other children who lack access. And the word of the day was ACCESS.  What better way to start the school year than to have a visit from educator/author Hallee Adelman. She and the BookSmiles crew put on a party! Fifty Philly teachers enjoyed an evening of food, raffles, golden-ticket prizes, and free books!  How great to kick off our partnership with the School District of Philadelphia at their Back-to-School Celebration & Bus Tour. Here are a few of our goals: 1. Serve as a common-sense alternative to the corporate book fairs, where most kids get priced out. We have free books at our Fair BookSmiles Book Faires! 2. Provide teachers with classroom libraries. 3. Inject hundreds of thousands of books into the day cares and childcare centers that feed Philly kindergartens and preschools.  In June 2018, when Larry was still teaching, he took a personal day and rented a U-Haul to transport 5000 books to Vineland where his teacher-friend Jane Arochas arranged drop-offs to different schools. This was our first big distribution to a school district. Seven years and over 3.2 million books later, we returned through Jane's effort. Enjoy the throwback pic and all of the photos showing Vineland book-joy in 2025!  |
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