We’re absolutely tickled to pass along the news  that the world’s largest trade publisher, Random House, Inc., has agreed to donate thousands of books for use in our upcoming iREAD pilot.  This is a huge deal for us: thanks to Random House’s generosity, we can provide some of the world’s best-known literature to hundreds of children in the developing world at no cost.

The books include such classic works as Peter Pan, The Secret Garden, and Moby-Dick, all professionally formatted for e-readers, and all free of charge for the children in Ghana.  Just looking down the list brings a huge smile to my face: to a literature major, books like Death in Venice,  Crime and Punishment, and Homer’s Odyssey are about as good as it gets.

This donation also includes the use of all 56 Magic Tree House collection by Mary Pope Osborne,  which was a favorite among children in Worldreader’s earlier study in Ayenyah, Ghana (as well as among my own daughters when they were younger!)   To help create a deep culture of reading, we there’s nothing better to get children “hooked” than a great series books, and once you start reading about Jack and Annie’s tree-house adventures with dinosaurs, mummies, and pirates, you don’t want to stop.

For a list of many of the books donated by Random House., Inc., and their sister imprint Bantam, click here. All of these books will be available to the children and teachers participating in the iREAD pilot, and complement the growing list of locally published books that we are digitizing.  We look forward to other local and international publishers following suit, and are  absolutely thrilled to have Random House, Inc., as a long-term partner to bring books to all.

by Zev Lowe

Our iREAD project kicks off in less than 3 weeks! In the middle of next month, over 350 Ghanaian kids at three grade levels (Primary 4, Junior High 1 and Senior High 1) will get virtually unlimited access to books.

It’s been a whirlwind of activity ramping up to this point. David and Colin are working on our tax structure (We’re now a 501(c)(3), giving us non-profit status under the US tax code!), fundraising efforts and securing a way to bring 350+ e-readers to Ghana. Susan is getting the word out about us (she spoke with Len Edgerly recently), and Elizabeth is marshaling the troops to increase our number of publishing partners and to get Ghanaian textbooks and storybooks digitized.

I’m writing from Brussels Airport where I have a layover on my way from the Worldreader home base (Barcelona) to Accra. Going to Ghana is always fun, but I’m doubly excited this time. On Saturday, we’ll begin the process of training the teachers who will be involved in our iREAD pilot study.

We will be running three workshops with the teachers on consecutive Saturdays, and providing one-on-one mentoring sessions between workshops. This weekend, we will start with an introduction to the people who will be supporting the pilot study — Joseph and Alex (our Accra-based team), ILC Africa (monitoring and evaluation specialists), and a veteran educator who will be assisting the the teachers with content and curriculum questions.

This will also be a good opportunity for the teachers to get to know each other, since they come from six different schools in two towns. Then we will do some hands-on exercises with the e-reader, before adjourning for the day.

The next two sessions will focus much more on incorporating the e-reader within the classroom. E-readers are minimally invasive in the classroom. Unlike computers, students are not distracted by games, or instant messages from their friends. But there are still adjustments to be made. Currently, the teachers are the only people in the classroom who have books. Students have exercise books which they use to copy down passages written on the blackboard. Now that everybody will have access to books, and writing chunks of the textbook on the board will no longer be necessary, teachers have the opportunity to structure their lessons differently.

We were expecting around three or four teachers from each school (English, Social Studies, etc — the subjects we can support with content). But their levels of curiosity and motivation have been overwhelming, and we have opened up our introductory training session to a larger group. In time, when we are able to give every teacher the materials they need, we’ll be able to deliver them efficiently, with the push of a button. Meanwhile, I look forward to our first session with the teachers on Saturday!

There’s a headline I never thought I’d write.

Yesterday we received notice from the US Internal Revenue Service that we’ve been approved as a 501(c)(3).  This confirms that all contributions made since our date of incorporation (March 23, 2010) are tax-deductible.  But just as importantly, it serves as a “Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval” for donors and partners that we’re a professional organization that operates within the guidelines set out by the IRS for charities concerning expense ratios, governance, and so forth.  All goodness.

Symbolically, we also love the fact that even the paper-obsessed IRS (no offense, but honestly: all correspondence had to be conducted by fax.  Fax?  What is this– 1982 all over again?) understands the value of digital books for all.  Books and paper aren’t going anywhere any time soon… but the digital publishing and reading offer amazing new possibilities to share information with every person in every corner of the planet.  We’re thrilled the IRS agrees.

For those interested, the application process took from Feb 18 to October 14th… start to finish in 240 days, not including some up-front prep work.  (Some people compare this to giving birth, and in terms of time, that’s not far off.  Way less fun, though, at least to start.)   Huge thanks to The Foundation Group ,who navigated the 501c3 labyrinth while avoiding the Minotaur, and particularly to Carolyn Nelson and the fantastic team at Brighton-Jones who handled all the real work with true grace and style.

Zev and Colin were in Ghana last week and here’s a quick update.  After an intense week, we are on track for the iRead pilot study to launch as planned during the second week of November.   You can’t imagine how complicated the logistics are!  The Kindle is a wonderful, life-changing device but it is made for a single user to unpack, set-up and begin uploading content.  The device in volume, however, is a whole different story.  Any day now the Kindles will arrive from abroad and we will need to unpack them, register each one per student for tracking purposes, upload content, outfit them with a M-Edge jacket and reading light–all before distributing them to different schools in Ghana.  Other details include getting connectivity, training teachers, preparing students, getting evaluators in place to test literacy rates, and thousands of other things.

Worldreader.org has made a significant decision after talking to our impact evaluators to increase our trial coverage by 50%.  That is to say, we will also cover younger Primary students as well as Junior and Senior Secondary students. Why?  Because we want to make this trial the most comprehensive it can possibly be before scaling up.  It makes perfect sense too- since reading habits are impacted by age.   Having access to books at a younger age might make a noticeable difference in increasing literacy rates.  While it means more work, we are really excited about this decision.  Joseph, our man on the ground,  has reacted immediately to this by quickly collecting all the necessary data we need from the field (not an easy task).

In his free moments, Colin has been tweeting his Top 5 Tips for NGOs…. I guess, once an educator, always an educator!

1. Learn how to ask for money and help from closest friends. Sounds easier than it is, but involve them.

2. Bring new ideas to development but read the history as well… In that order!

3. Decide if are you an NGO or a social enterprise. Big difference!

4. A well-selected Advisory Board can open doors you didn’t know existed.

5. Maybe a great idea but it’s still all about you and what YOU can deliver. Funders don’t give money to ideas, they fund people.

You can follow him on twitter for the second installment.

More news soon!

Yesterday, Colin was asked some questions by BBC’s Sophie Ikenye about Worldreader’s “innovative project”. He spoke about e-readers and why they will make a difference in Africa and the rest of the developing world.

When asked about the choice of e-reader technology and what’s in it for African families, Colin answered, “they address the problem that education systems have had in Africa where paper, consequently books, simply doesn’t reach.”   He also spoke about the dropping prices of e-reader technology and how wireless phones pave the way for our project to work.   You can hear the three-minute interview as it aired on BBC’s Focus on Africa.

Colin and Zev are flying to Accra today for a week of meetings before the iRead pilot study.  Stay tuned!

This week thousands of publishers attended the Frankfurt Book Fair and there was quite a bit of noise about e-books in the developed world.  At the same time, Worldreader.org was thrilled to announce an accord with Sub Saharan publishers to make available the first of thousands of e-books by African authors in Amazon.com.  Now available for the first time outside of Africa, children’s and young adult fiction from Ghana can be purchased worldwide, at prices of less than $5.00 each.  All proceeds are split between publishers and with Worldreader.org’s programs offering e-books in Ghanaian schools.  Our partner publishers now have access to a global audience, and new readers will have access to literature from a different culture.

WSJ’s Market Watch, Read Write Web, and TechCrunch Europe all agreed that it is “yet another cool initiative” and needless to say, we are really excited about it.   Publisher’s Weekly took notice and wrote about Worldreader’s ambitious mission – “to bring e-books and e-readers to the developing world and, along with them, a self-sustaining reading and publishing culture.”

It was an exciting week for our publishing division.  And as Elizabeth pointed out in our group meeting today, we are well on our way of not only bringing “Books to All”, but “ALL Books to All”.