The focus for the team this time is to put your generous donations to work by creating our second youth library in a YEGO youth centre in Kayonza District. Also during this trip, the team will distribute more than a thousand books to gradeschoolers at two rural schools in Muhanga District, Biti Elementary and Ecole Primaire Gitingati. We will also distribute more than 300 dictionaries and a dozens of donated soccer jerseys.

This library and these book donations were made possible by supporters who donated to our holiday fundraising campaigns, as well as local Rotary Clubs including Rotary Club of Langley Sunrise, which kindly provided a matching grant.

We’d also like to thank schools that raised money for books through Toonies for Change. Special thanks go to St. Helen’s School in Burnaby which donated $1,400 at the last minute from their Me to We Day, enabling us to donate 700 of the books!

On this trip, the Grace Rwanda team will include co-founder Elizabeth Johnson, UBC PhD student and volunteer videographer Jordan Levine, former Grace Rwanda board chair Franco Bordignon and his daughter, Stephanie, and Sechelt volunteer Elizabeth Dilasser.

In the photo above, Johnson (c) and Bordignon (r) are joined at the St. Helen’s School Me to We Day by Vancouver Canucks centre Mike Santorelli (l). It was fun for us to come full circle by meeting a Canucks team player — longtime supporters of Grace Rwanda will remember we had schoolchildren in Rwinkwavu cheering and waving Canucks flags in 2010! Wouldn’t it be great to get their team behind our team?

We’re excited about sharing our progress in bringing literacy to Rwandan youth with you in the coming weeks. Stay tuned!

You can get regular updates by following @GraceRwanda, liking us on Facebook, adding us in your Google+ circle, and watching our videos on YouTube.

Grace Rwanda’s grand opening of the Muhanga Youth Centre Library was covered by a Rwandan local news program. Click the image above to watch the clip.

The official grand opening was Sept. 2, 2013. The community appreciated the new books, dictionaries, magazines and journals, tables and chairs and book shelves we provided. The youth who use the facility to do their homework now have some excellent reading resources. This piece gives a great overview of the work we are doing there to bring books and literacy to youth. Plus, watch the wonderful dancers at the opening ceremonies!

Our youth centre library was so successful that a Rwandan government ministry asked to partner with us to create 20 more such libraries in YEGO youth centres across the country.

Elizabeth was much in demand by the local Rwandan media during her trip. In addition to the news broadcast, reporters from area newspapers came to interview her at the library launch.

If you are curious about our coverage in Kinyarwandan, have a look at these articles published in Umuseke and  Izuba Rirashe.

Want to see more of Grace Rwanda in action? Check new photos of the Muhanga project on our Flickr site.

We’re thrilled to be launching the next phase of our “Let’s Read Together” mini-libraries program this fall. Stay tuned for news about upcoming fundraisers and events to support our exciting new initiative. Learn more at Toonies4Change.org.

Stay in the loop with us by following @GraceRwanda, liking us on Facebook, adding us in your Google+ circle, watching our videos on YouTube.

This summer, the Grace Rwanda team set out to Muhanga, a rural district of 350,000 residents southeast of Rwanda’s capital, Kigali.

We have been working with education officials there on an ambitious new plan. Over the next few years we are commiting to putting a mini-library in every school in the district: about 104 elementary schools and 42 secondary schools.

We want to get a book into the hands of each of Muhanga’s 87,000 students. We plan to start by fundraising to put mini-libraries in all Grades 1 to 3 classrooms, serving more than 43,500 students.

Our goal in Rwanda this summer was to get more students reading immediately. So, to kick off our Muhanga schools campaign, Grace Rwanda created and stocked a new mini-library in a community centre in Nyamabuye, called the Muhanga Youth Friendly Centre.

Youth and students from the area, about 30-50 each day, were using the facility to study and do their homework. Now, with the help of a $6,000 new mini-library, complete with new bookshelves, stacks of new books, dictionaries and periodicals, plus new tables and chairs, they have access to more books and resources to help them succeed.

The District Vice Mayor was on hand to open the new library facility and the community is very excited to move forward with Grace Rwanda on upcoming school library projects.

Check out more fantastic photos of the Muhanga project on our Flickr site.

We’re thrilled to be launching the next phase of our “Let’s Read Together” mini-libraries program this fall. Stay tuned for news about upcoming fundraisers and events to support our exciting new initiative.

Stay in the loop with us by following @GraceRwanda, liking us on Facebook, and visiting Toonies4Change.org.