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Commitment in Action: Room to Read

Credit: Room to Read

This September, leaders and change-makers from around the world will join President Clinton at the Clinton Global Initiative (CGI) Annual Meeting in New York City. Among them will be John Wood, founder of Room to Read, an organization that partners with governments and local communities to establish libraries, build schools, publish children’s books, and help girls complete secondary school.

More than 750 million people worldwide are illiterate, and the majority are women and girls. And each day, more than 300 million children around the world wake up and do not attend school. John founded Room to Read after witnessing these problems firsthand in Nepal. In 2007, when the organization was looking to expand its flagship program and find new partners to reach additional children in Africa and Asia, John attended the CGI Annual Meeting.

As a result of the meeting, Room to Read made a CGI Commitment to Action to open 5,000 additional libraries by 2010, bringing Room to Read’s total to 10,000 libraries worldwide. Room to Read also committed to self-publish 350 new children’s books in local languages, and to more than double its impact by reaching 5 million children through its programs. Through the CGI commitment, Scholastic Inc. agreed to provide at least 750,000 English-language children’s books to help fill the new libraries. Additional funding partners, including one met through CGI, committed to provide resources needed to train librarians and teachers, purchase child-friendly shelving and furniture, and stock each library with approximately 1,000 books.

In April 2010, Room to Read celebrated the completion of its CGI commitment when it opened its 10,000th library, located in Nepal. Room to Read, operating now in nine countries, opens an average of six new Reading Rooms per day. Each and every day, approximately 3,000 children become beneficiaries of the program. By the end of 2010, the organization will have improved the lives of more than 5 million children throughout Asia and Africa.

John and Room to Read continue to attend CGI’s Annual Meeting each year, and Room to Read aims to double its impact yet again by reaching more than 10 million children with quality programming by 2015.