Contact: Isaac Tufvesson


OLOS Communications Specialist


(312) 280-2140


itufvesson@ala.org

NEWS


For Immediate Release


June 24, 2008

Coretta Scott King Book Award Committee announces 2008 Book Donation Grant Winners

The Coretta Scott King (CSK) Book Award Committee is pleased to announce that Children Up (formerly the Friends of the United Youth Action for Progress), Gulu, Uganda (East Africa), The PEAK Learning Center, Thornton, Color. and the Paul Cuffee School will receive the 2008 Coretta Scott King Review Book Donation Grant.

The grant was established to find a home for the books that the American Library Association (ALA) receives for the Coretta Scott King Author and Illustrator Awards each year, as well as provide exposure to winning authors, illustrators and books. The awards are administered by ALA’s Ethnic and Multicultural Information Exchange Round Table (EMIERT).

“Many people think the only problem in the north [of Uganda] is food. But the real problem is education of the children,” said Emmanual Mwaka, UYAP Program Director. The United Youth Action for Progress (UYAP) cares for more than 300 children who are homeless, especially during the night hours, in fear of abduction by rebels. This Te Okono Center, in Gulu Uganda, also educates the children about their Alcholi culture. It is a culture which holds to peace and reconciliation as basic societal tenets.

The PEAK Learning Center was born in the fall of 2001 when Adams 12 Five Star Schools was awarded a very competitive federal 21st Century Grant. PEAK Learning Center’s target population is students in grades 3-5 who are significantly below grade level in reading. Its mission is to provide equitable opportunities to low-income children and their families and in turn raise academic achievement. Its after school programs include intergenerational tutoring, individual reading instruction, homework help, skill building activities, enrichment, recreation and transportation.

The Paul Cuffee Charter School was founded in 2001 in response to the need to improve the quality of public education available in Providence, R.I. It was formed with the intention of creating a site-managed, innovative public school for urban children that fosters personal initiative and social responsibility and truly prepares its students for success in college and beyond.

The Coretta Scott King Review Book Donation Grant aims to help build collections and bring books into the lives of children in latchkey, preschool programs, faith-based reading projects, homeless shelters, charter schools and under-funded libraries. An enduring message of the Coretta Scott King Book Award Committee’s Public Awareness Campaign is that books and reading can only add value to children's lives if books are present in their lives along with opportunities to read and be read to.

For more information, and to download the application, visit
http://www.ala.org/csk