Whilesome of us struggle to work through our towering “to be read” piles, in manyparts of the country, children don’t have any books at all. Accessto literature — and particularly access to titles that interest kids —remains key to improving national literacy, which, in turn, is connected tomany markers of a happy, productive life. 

To celebrate Children’s Book Week (May 6-12), a new group of nonprofitscalled the Diverse Books for All Coalitionhas purchased 145,000 books for kids who live in low-income communities. Thesebooks — from Abrams, Barefoot, Candlewick and Penguin Random House — have beenselected to help kids “see themselves and learn about others from theirearliest years.” 

The books, for children from birth to age 8, will be distributed for free orat little cost to families, schools and other organizations across thecountry. 

This bulk book purchase — worth about $1.5 million — is the first steptoward the coalition’s goal of using its market power to buy and distribute600,000 books in 2024. That work has been jump-started by grants from theKellogg Foundation and the Buffett Early Childhood Fund. If you’d like to help,donate here.

Why do I trust them? The Diverse Books for All Coalition was foundedby First Book, a nonprofit I’ve written about several times. In 2015, FirstBook won the David M. Rubenstein Prize, given by the Library of Congress toorganizations that demonstrate “outstanding and measurable contributions inincreasing literacy.”

-         Ron Charles, The Washington Post