Building with Books (BwB) is a non-profit organization that empowers primarily urban U.S. high school students through in-class and intensive after-school programs. In addition to tremendous contributions of community service in their own cities and neighborhoods, BwB youth actually build schools and bring literacy to children and adults in developing countries around the world. BwB programs are designed to build confidence and real-world capabilities in American youth while also empowering communities world-wide to overcome the crippling cycle of illiteracy, poverty and low expectations by opening the door to education.
BwB’s unique approach not only encourages involvement but produces tangible results. In the past year alone, BwB students in the U.S. have contributed more than 100,000 hours of service and touched the lives of 223,000 elders, young children, and people who are disabled or homeless in their communities. Since 1992, U.S. student volunteers have helped build more than 285 schools in rural regions of developing nations including Haiti, Malawi, Mali, Nepal, Nicaragua and Senegal. More than 110,000 children and adults have attended those schools, with 30,000 currently enrolled. Cumulatively, parents in developing countries have contributed more than 569,000 volunteer work days toward building schools, taking the first step toward changing their own lives and their communities.
The significance of BwB's involvement cannot be minimized. Villagers in developing nations are becoming literate as a result of BwB-built schools, and 97% of students involved with BwB programs in the U.S. go on to college. In other words, no matter what sort of challenges youth face in their communities, families and schools – if they are empowered, they will succeed.
Rather than resting upon its accomplishments, BwB is looking forward to engaging significantly more youth in the U.S. and globally. By 2012, the organization envisions 760 schools built that will have served some 286,000 children in some of the poorest countries, as well as 270 U.S. after-school programs that will have empowered more than 25,000 students. These American students will have reached out to hundreds of thousands of people every year. Or, to put it grandly yet realistically, BwB hopes to touch the lives of more than 1,000,000 people around the world.