“It is essential that all people have the opportunity to see themselves represented with dignity and humanity in the books that we share. This promotes the growth of wellbeing, understanding, and acceptance in our world.”
LITTLE FREE LIBRARY AT HASTINGS HOUSE COOP
HASTINGS ON HUDSON, NEW YORK
“Everyone deserves to see themselves in the books they read and the stories they love.”
MR. PEBBLE’S MEMORIAL LIBRARY
OLD BRIDGE, NEW JERSEY
9174 pledges
and counting...
ASPIRA as a youth mentoring program has leveraged the voices of the youth within the charter school community to address the deficit in literary accessibility for those who identify as BIPOC and English Language Learners within the city of Rochester. Our mission: Every youth with a book in hand.
Everyone, especially children/young adults, deserves to see themselves and their experiences in books–to know they are worthy and their stories have value. Books connect us across rivers, oceans, and countries; show us our humanity–our sameness and our differences; spark our imagination and our reality. Children and adults deserve this.
I feel our community needs to read diverse books to better understand our minorities and one another.
I wholeheartedly believe that stories create empathy and that empathy helps us to understand others, particularly those whose experiences are different from our own, thereby transforming the world in which we live.