If You Give a Kid a Book

BookEnds

In 1993, 8-year-old Brandon Keefe believed he could make a difference. By 1998, he was, forming BookEnds as nonprofit organization in Southern California that is about kids helping kids. The organization recycles children's books through student-run book drives and places them in schools and youth organizations in need of books. They believe that a literate child is the foundation of a thriving community. By providing access to books, children are given the resources to develop literacy skills and to experience the joy and imagination of reading.

Recipients of the BookEnds program include:

• Inner City Schools
• Youth Centers
• Homeless Shelters
• Family Literacy Centers
• After-school Enrichment Programs
• Children's Group Homes
• Juvenile Detention Facilities

For recipient organizations the ratio of books to kids is 3 to 1; the national average is 22 to 1.  Each dollar donated to BookEnds results in more than five dollars worth of books for kids.

BookEnds believes in the power of community service. Through Bookends students have the opportunity to change their lives and the lives of others through community service. Student volunteers collect, sort and personally deliver donated books to quality libraries and inspire a passion for reading.

The Stats to Date:

• 22,000 student volunteers
• 585 empty libraries filled in the Greater Los Angeles area
• 2.1 million books delivered
• Serving over 520,000 at-risk children

For more information please visit BookEnds.

Gifts Making a Difference

Suitcases4Kids is dedicated to helping foster children move with dignity, one suitcase at a time.

History

In 1995 10-year-old Aubyn Burnside had a great idea. Burnside had recently discovered that the average child in foster care has to move three or four times and they carry everything they own in garbage bags."I thought it was horrible that the children had nothing to carry their things in as they moved so many times. I wanted to make them feel special by giving them something of their own," Burnside explained. It wasn't long before the media picked up on the story. Burnside even made an appearance on Oprah and was named one of Oprah's Young Angels of her Angel Network.

A New Chapter

By 2009 the project was all but defunct as Burnside had directed her attention towards other endeavors. Enter Ron Nickerson. He is the founder and president of Suitcases4Kids*, having decided to use his talents and contacts to help children in the foster care system. It was during his research to determine how to best channel his talents that Nickerson discovered Burnside's project and realized it was a perfect fit to accomplish his goals. Nickerson has spent the last 25-years working with children and their families in a variety of settings including residential facilities and psychiatric hospitals. He has also been a social worker for kids in specialized foster care and director of a 30 bed youth detention facility in Boston. Currently Nickerson is a foster dad to several boys with Reactive Attachment Disorder. 

Some Stats

• Number of children in the United States foster care system: over 463,000 (as of 01/2010) 
• Average length of stay in foster care: 27.2 months. 
• Number of children waiting for adoption: 125,535
• Number of children abused or neglected: 742,661

For more information on the organization and how you can help please visit the Suitcases4Kids website.

*Please note the name of the organization Aubyn Burnside founded is Suitcases for Kids. You can visit the organization's site here. (The site has not been updated in several years).

A Shelter of Hope and Healing

Enchanted Makeovers' mission is to transform shelters for women and children into heartwarming havens, uplift the human spirit and empower individuals from all walks of life to pursue their dreams.Interior design Terry Grahl founded the organization in 2009, after spending several years working with women's shelters as a side project of her interior design business. The organization works on a project basis, gathering volunteers and donors to create a lasting impact at shelters. Projects can mean a complete redecoration of the physical space with handmade items and furnishing, or it can mean offering programs and activities such as: gardening, yoga, inspirational hands-on activities, personal makeovers, sewing and cooking classes, handmade gifts provide by crafters from around the world, and the sharing of personal stories.

The organization is guided by the following beliefs:

• Everyone is worthy of surroundings that will nurture their soul and allow their greatness to emerge
• Without attention to their spirit, there can be no healing
• Handmade items are very important to the recovery process. It comes with the love and hope of the creator
• A donor's story is woven into each handmade item that is donated
• An Open Mind and Open Heart policy- we reach out and help everyone no matter what background or faith
• To see ourselves in everyone
• It's very important to think and behave in a loving way to ALL people
• Actions speak louder than words
• If you can tap into your imagination you can get through remarkable things
• The journey is just as important as the destination
• In helping everyone to fall in love with who they are
• Love should be in the smallest detail
• Everyone has value and needs to be heard
• Child-like faith
• In Unity- the state or quality of being one; oneness
• In Dignity- respect for the worth of every person
• In Integrity- honesty and justice
• In Character- moral and ethical strength
• In Serving- the best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others (Mahatma Gandhi)

What drew me to this organization, was its understanding that providing shelter is just one step in healing process- a physical change in conditions. That in order to truly help these women and children, they need spiritual and emotional nurturing as well. Everyone deserves to live their life with dignity. Enchanted Makeovers is making that possible; in many cases restoring it.  For more information please visit Enchanted Makeovers

Sustainable Travel & Tourism

Background

Sustainable Travel International (STI) is a leader in sustainable tourism development. The organization's mission is to promote sustainable development through responsible travel by providing programs that help travelers, businesses and destinations protect the environment, preserve cultural heritage and promote economic development.

Founded in 2002, STI is committed to providing education and outreach services that help travelers, travel providers and destinations support environmental conservation and protect cultural heritage while promoting cross-cultural understanding and economic development.

STI is dedicated to taking the holistic approach to addressing sustainable development within the travel and tourism industries by providing solutions-oriented programs that generate tangible results and affect long-lasting change.

Priorities

STI priorities include:

• Provide capacity development through education and training to travelers, the travel trade, and local stakeholders and assist them in making positive contributions to environmental conservation and socio-cultural sustainability.
• Develop, adopt, and promote sustainable tourism standards and industry best practices through the Sustainable Tourism Eco-Certification Program (STEP) and other initiatives that are aligned with the Global Sustainable Tourism Criteria.
• Support the establishment of local travelers' philanthropy projects and investments in renewable energy, energy efficiency and forestry-related carbon offset projects that offer co-benefits and help to mitigate unavoidable greenhouse gas emissions.
• Empower destinations to use tourism and related market-based solutions to support sustainable development and generate tangible, measurable results that affect change.

Programs

Advisory Services - STI specializes in business and sustainable tourism development. They make use of professional experts when forming any given consulting team, which affords them great flexibility in where they are able to work and the types of projects taken on.

Book Travel - With STI you can book your trip with confidence. From eco-lodges in Alaska to community-based tourism in Zambia, STI provides a full range of sustainable and responsible travel options.

Buy Local Products - works with Brighter Futures, a venture that enables you to buy hand-crafted and fair-trade products directly from local villagers via the Internet.

Carbon Offsets - invests in clean energy and supports sustainable development while helping offset the CO2 emissions that result from your travel, home, or business.

Eco-Certification - designed to help travelers easily identify responsible tourism businesses and to help tourism businesses manage their impacts; lower costs through resource productivity and waste reduction while contributing to environmental conservation and the well-being of local people.

Eco-Directory - a unique destination guide aimed at helping travelers make responsible choices that only advertises eco-friendly tourism businesses.

Education & Training - provides education and training programs to tourism businesses, government agencies, and non-profits. STI's curricula is flexible, customized to the needs of the trainees, and can be delivered one-on-one or through workshops, training manuals, or on-line through distance learning.

Green Travel Market - designed for tourism businesses that want to 'green' their supply chains, this database features sustainable tourism products that are available in the global marketplace.

Membership - membership is open to individuals, tourism businesses and others who support and are committed to sustainable tourism.

Travelers' Philanthropy - helps to support community development, biodiversity conservation, and other environmental, socio-cultural and economic improvements. It also offers the opportunity to learn how to create a successful travel philanthropy program.

For more information place visit STI's website.