News

Books For Africa spent the first week of June in Washington, DC, meeting with African ambassadors, U.S. congressional leaders, the African Union, donors, and development partners. Highlights included participation in African Union events, advocacy meetings on Capitol Hill, and the annual Summit Society Reception hosted by the Kenyan Embassy. The reception welcomed donors and diplomatic representatives from 10 African countries and featured the distribution of Merck/MSD e-readers loaded with medical resources for healthcare professionals across Africa. The visit strengthened relationships with key partners and generated new opportunities to expand Books For Africa's impact across the continent. Executive Director Patrick Plonski called the meetings highly productive and an important step toward increasing the shipment of books and educational resources to Africa.

Books For Africa hosted in Minnesota last week H.E. Constance’s Gaspar, Ambassador from African Union to the U.S., and H.E. Agostinho Van-Dunem, Ambassador from Angola to the U.S.  Both spoke at our annual fundraiser.  We were pleased to have them update our Books For Africa community about issues and trends in Angola, and across the African continent.  We look forward to continued collaboration in the future with these ambassadors to ship more books to Angola, and across Africa. We raised over $191,000 to ship more books to Africa. Thank you to all of our donors who helped to make this happen!

Books For Africa Executive Director travels to Djibouti and Tunisia.  Pat received tours from high level officials, had a visit at a local primary school was extremely well-organized and well-received as this school and partners thanked us for the books received.  The US Ambassador to Djibouti was on site as was Djibouti’s Minister of National Education.  The event was extremely high-level and covered by Djiboutian national television. 

The article highlights a global literacy initiative led by the San José State University School of Information called Soma Safari, focused on improving access to books and education in underserved communities—especially in Keny

The Books For Africa Law and Democracy Initiative was pleased to host a reception yesterday at the University of Minnesota Humphrey School of Public Policy featuring as keynote speaker Chief Justice Rizine Mzikamanda from Malawi. 

Books For Africa is pleased to announce details for our annual spring fundraiser. Our event will take place on Wednesday, May 13th, at Midland Hills Country Club in Roseville, Minnesota.  There will be a 9 a.m. breakfast option, and a 12-noon luncheon option.  We are excited that our keynote speaker will be H.E. Constancia Gaspar, African Union Ambassador to the United States.  Ambassador Gaspar is a native of Angola and we look forward to hearing her thoughts about education in Africa, and other issues of importance across the African continent.  Special thanks to Thomson Reuters for serving as Presenting Sponsor for this event again this year.  Also thanks to our other valued sponsors:  the Stillman Family Foundation, Frank Babka, Dan Melin, Lerner Publishing, RBC, and MGK.