CAAC kicked off the 4th AAPI book drive for Cambridge and Somerville schools on May 1st 2024, the first day of the Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) Heritage Month.
The fundraising is from May 2024 to Feb 2025, 100% of the money raised will be used to purchase newly released AAPI author’s book and donate to schools in Cambridge and Somerville.
The donation can be made by paypal, venmo, zelle, and the details and more methods can be found on our donation page.
Summary of previous book drives
Every year since 2021, CAAC had run 3 annual AAPI book drives, $26,332 was raised and more than 1900 books were donated:
- School year 2021/2022, raised $12,374, donated 955 books to 33 schools in Cambridge and Somerville.
- School year 2022/2023, raised $5538.62
- $4341.66 for Cambridge, donated 270 books to 17 CPS schools.
- $1241.31 for Somerville, the funds are reserved and our partner, Somerville Asian Family Network (SAFN), is under the process of making the donation.
- School year 2023/2024, raised $8419.94 including $400 for Somerville, donated 702 books and sponsored Kelly Yang’s talk for all 4th and 5th graders of CPS schools.
Appreciation
Thanks to the individual donors and corp/university sponsors, including
- Sumiao Hunan Kitchen 素描湘 (sponsor of 2nd and 3rd book drive)
- MIT (sponsor of 2nd and 3rd)
- Splice Realty – Park Hou Group (sponsor of 1st and 3rd)
- UCA Community Foundation
- Dr. Hao Wang / 汪浩博士
- Moderna ASPIRE (Asian and Pacific Islander Resources and Engagement)
- Pfizer and Global Asian Alliance
- Google Cambridge
- Sanofi
Details of the 3rd AAPI book drive for Cambridge Public Schools
Fundraising: Total $8419.94 includes individual donation $3619.94 and sponsorship $4800.
Paypal and Venmo transaction fees: (– $61.26)
Somerville funding pool: (-$400). (it added-on to the total of $1641.31 for Somerville funding pool towards AAPI book donation for Somerville public schools)
Rolled over from bookdrive 2022/2023: (+$59.22)
Book purchase:
- 222 books ordered on Amazon.com on Dec 17, 2023: (-$2,534.40)
- Purchased 100 copies of Finally Heard by Kelly Yang from Belmont books in January to sponsor Kelly’s visit on for all 4th and 5th grade students of CPS on Feb 27, 2024: (-$1519.20)
- The budget of $3964.30 for CPS librarians of 17 schools to purchase 380 AAPI books.
Total Admin Expense: $0 (we actually spend our operational fund to support the project, such as purchasing the materials of the bookplate)
As below is the bookplate that has been or will be applied to each book we donated/sponsored in this book drive.
Special event
Sponsored Kelly Yang (the author of Front Desk book series) author’s visit. Part of the AAPI book drive project, CAAC sponsored Kelly Yang’s visit on Feb 27, 2024 for all 4th and 5th graders of CPS schools. CAAC used $1519.20 from the whole funding to purchase 100 copies of the Finally Heard.
“Kids are clamoring to read her books across the city. We had 446 students and teachers viewing the live stream on Feb. 27. Those who were not free on the 27th at that time will have access to the recording.” Sarah T. Novogrodsky, Director of Library Media Services
The feedback
Book donations to school libraries, received the publicity around the CAAC books from one of the school libraries as below.
Received a thank you card from CPSD
Fundraising status of the current book drive (4th, 2024/2025)