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Books For Africa has received Charity Navigator’s 4-star rating for the sixth consecutive year, the highest possible rating. Charity Navigator is the country’s premiere charity evaluator and rates charities on sound fiscal management and commitment to accountability and transparency. The perfect Charity Navigator rating comes just before Books For Africa and other groups around the world are celebrating International Literacy Day on September 8, sponsored for the past 50 years by UNESCO, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization.

Books For Africa has partnered with Merck & Co. to donate 52 tablets loaded with the new Merck Medical Manual mobile app! These tablets were delivered by fellows from the State Department's Young African Leadership Initiative (YALI), and will provide valuable resources to medical practitioners across the African continent.

Leaving the Books For Africa warehouse in Atlanta last week was a 40-foot sea container holding 22,000 books departing for the Kofi Annan Institute for Conflict Transformation Project in Monrovia, Liberia. In addition to large quantities of books on general topics, a law/human rights library was provided courtesy of Thomson Reuters and the BFA Law & Democracy Initiative.

The annual reception honoring Books For Africa’s Kilimanjaro Society donors was held July 27 at the University Club of St. Paul. It was also attended by 25 young African leaders in residency at the Humphrey Institute of the University of Minnesota and featured a poolside concert with local reggae band Ipso Facto!

Twenty-five young African leaders commemorated Nelson Mandela International Day on Tuesday by volunteering at the Books For Africa warehouse in St. Paul. On the day, named for the late South African leader and dedicated to service in his honor, they sorted and packed books for the organization and got a briefing on its mission to end the book famine in Africa. Books for Africa has shipped more than 38 million books to 49 countries since its founding in 1988.

25 fellows with the Mandela Washington Fellowship, which is run by the U.S. State Department, observed Mandela Day by converging at the Saint Paul warehouse of Books for Africa to sort and pack books that are bound for Africa. The State Department runs the fellowship through the Young African Leaders Initiative (YALI) which this year has brought 1,000 promising African leaders for six-week long residencies at universities across the country. This was one of former president Barack Obama’s signature initiatives targeting the African continent.