How would you like $6,000 to improve the book collection at your school’s library? The
Laura Bush Foundation for America’s Libraries annually awards grants for school libraries to update, extend, and diversify their book collections.
West Kearney High School at the Youth Rehabilitation Training Center is a 2010 grant recipient. Sue Divan, School Librarian and G.E.D instructor at the school, shared her experience since receiving the $6,000 grant:
I have been able to buy lots of popular fiction and series books for our media center as well as complete several of our series collections. The youth have been giving me requests for more books every week. My state budget is $3960 for Ed & Recreational Supplies. This is where everything but computers and subscriptions comes out of. There is not much left for books after I purchase equipment such as the 2 LCD projectors I bought in July. The LBF grant will greatly improve our collection of fiction, series fiction and non-fiction, science, poetry, philosophy, reference and Nebraska books.
Sue had this to say about the application process:
The grant is completed and submitted online only so it was interesting to complete it. I did everything “cut and paste” over a couple of weeks and then spent an entire day going over everything and entering the grant online. It was fairly easy once I had all of my answers in MSWord to complete it.
Sounds manageable, doesn’t it? And the pay-off, well…who couldn’t use $6,000 to buy books for the kids and teens in their school? If you are interested in this grant and would like to learn more about the grant’s guidelines, visit
http://www.laurabushfoundation.org/web2/index.html. Applications are due by
December 31, 2010.
Keep in mind, only schools where a minimum of 50 percent of the student body qualifies for free or reduced-price lunches are eligible to apply for LBF regular grants. And, funds are available only for library books and magazine/serial copies and subscriptions. All LBF grants are made to individual schools rather than to school districts, county systems, private organizations, foundations, or other entities.
If you would like assistance in navigating the application, please contact me, Kathryn Brockmeier, by
e-mailing me or by calling me at 402-471-4002 or 800-307-2665. Best of luck!
