History of AAUW Booklovers’ Community Contributions (2018)

The Orlando/Winter Park Branch of AAUW inaugurated its first Booklovers reading group in 1996 with five members.  Over the 22 years since then, our groups have multiplied to ten.  Early on, we chose to support book and reading-themed projects in our community from annual member donations.  Because of our membership expansion over years, we have been able to generate increased funding.  From Booklovers annual $10 per member donation, we have funded the following community resources:

Winter Park Day Nursery

 (2001-2004):  Booklovers initiated a program to donate new and used books, donating over 1,000 books stamped with our branch name.  We donated over $700 worth of new books from the WPDN wish list.  These books enabled the nursery to stock a dedicated library addition built by the nursery for that purpose.  Parents working full time were

unable to afford the time to visit public libraries or the finances to buy books to read to their small, preliterate children after their work days.

PACE Center for Girls:  (1998-present)

 CLASSROOM

(May, 2009)  We purchased a number of films selected for their qualities of female empowerment, inspiration and exposure to a broad range of international and national experiences of girls and women.  This project was coordinated by Anne Landrum ($374.89).

(2010-present)  Booklovers purchased books and STEM supplies requested by the faculty ($1,257.85).

(2015)  We funded a summer reading program ($198.91).

LIBRARY

Booklovers initiated the organization of their library collection under the guidance of member/school media specialist, Peggy Hatton, in 1998.  There was no dedicated room in which to house their collection.  We purchased and donated a vocational series called Cool Careers Without College in July, 2008 (3 sets of 8 books each), chosen by Peggy Hatton and the sale negotiated by Anne Landrum ($386.85).

Upon the retirement of Booklovers Coordinator Martha Williamson in 2010, members gave the PACE center a memorial bookcase marking a formal beginning of the PACE library.  In 2013, a Booklovers committee organized by

Anne Landrum undertook formal organization of the PACE library in a dedicated room of their school.  The collection consisted of donated and purchased new and used books.  We purchased books and the library supplies to process them ($1,006.89 ).  We paid for the computer, cataloging software program, and bar code reader ($549).  PACE staff did most of the data processing but branch members assisted.  Maintaining the Library is an ongoing project of Booklovers.

SCHOOLWIDE

We donated $500 (2014-2017) annually to the Images of PACE fundraiser luncheon.  We funded an outing (2017) for the girls to see the Hidden Figures film ($300) and uniform tee shirts ($100.01).  We donated $500 (2018) to our branch Rialis scholarship.

[Submitted by Martha Williamson]