UBC Reports | Vol. 47 | No. 07 | April 5, 2001

Dream comes true with community book drive

Lecturer Graham Mallet set some wheels in motion when he heard of a graduate student's dream

An empty space in children's lives and a library room in Oaxaca, Mexico will be filled by 10,000 children's books from Delta, B.C.

The 3,800 kilograms of books were donated by children and adults and collected by Delta schools through the Tsawwassen Rotary Club which stored, packaged and arranged for the books' transport.

The idea for the project began when Mario Lopez, a teacher from Oaxaca, was presenting his master's thesis in children's literature in the Faculty of Education last May. In attendance was Graham Mallet, who teaches in the faculty's Language and Literacy Education Dept.

Mallett became intrigued by a major goal mentioned by Lopez -- to set up a children's library in Oaxaca, a city of one million people, where illiteracy among children is a major problem.

The dream moved closer to reality when Mallett, a member of the Tsawwassen Rotary Club, arranged for Lopez to speak to the club. Lopez explained that the library had given him space, but he didn't have any books.

Club members rolled up their sleeves and began spreading the word. Storage space was offered by Tsawwassen dentist Frank Donis. Mexicana Freight Lines kindly agreed to transport the books to Oaxaca free of charge. In addition, the Rotary Club donated $1,000 for the purchase of Spanish language books.