From January to May, Book Bank hosted book drives at numerous Bay Area schools and collected over 3,000 books for three underserved schools in Oakland. Thank you to everyone who donated!
Establishing A Connection
In November, Book Bank received emails from the Korematsu Discovery Academy, the Sankofa Academy, and the Think College Now schools in Oakland asking for K-5 and K-8 book donations.
Organizing Book Drives
Through the months of January to May, several Book Bank Branch Directors — Atherton, Cupertino, Los Altos, San Francisco, San Jose, Santa Clara — held book drives at their schools and surrounding areas. Together, they collected over 3,000 books.
GOING TO OAKLAND
Annie and Gabriel represented Book Bank at Oakland. On May 29th, 2019, they loaded a U-HAUL with 3,000 books and left for the first school — Korematsu Discovery Academy.
Korematsu Discovery Academy
Annie and Gabriel met with Korematsu's early literacy coach, and unloaded eight boxes from the truck. Korematsu has many Spanish-speaking students, so we made sure to include Spanish books in our donations to Korematsu. At recess, we invited some of the kids to come and select a couple of books to take home.
Sankofa Academy
Next, Annie and Gabriel met with the instructional teacher leader and the principal. They unloaded another eight boxes. It was Sankofa's last day of school, so the books came just in time for summer reading.
Think College Now
Finally, Annie and Gabriel met with TCN's reading teacher and unloaded the last eight boxes. TCN also has a large population of Spanish-speaking students, so we made sure to account for them in our donations.
CONCLUDING THOUGHTS
The Oakland Campaign took countless hours to plan, coordinate, and execute. We all learned a lot in the process, and are excited to use our experiences with this campaign and further streamline future campaigns to create more effective change.
Special thanks to
Book Bank leaders: Annie Ma, Sophie Wang, Gabriel Yang
Book Bank Directors: Molly Bradley, Melody Chen, Meredith Fenyo, Rhea Parida, Franklin Ruan, Anita Sagar