Maya Rajan and Abby Katherine are hitting the books hard – literally – in their senior year at St. Mary Catholic Secondary School.
The pair launched their Pocket Library project back in the fall with the goal of collecting 5,000 books to bolster five school libraries across Hamilton; when FlamboroughToday caught up with them just before Christmas, they had amassed 4,000 books, and were expecting a few more to get them to the finish line.
Both Grade 12 students also belong to the St. Mary Health Action team, and have worked on several initiatives that promote mental health at the school, such as organizing support animal visits for students. But they were looking for a way to do an impactful project with special meaning.
“We wanted to do something that we had a passion connected to it,” said Katherine, who lives in Greensville and plans to study psychology. “We always were passionate about books and we wanted to do a book project but we didn’t have an outlet to do that.”
The pair researched their options, and found a good fit with the DECA business club.
“We realized there was a way that we could get some help on our project by our advisors,” said Katherine. “We integrated both of them together.”
They soon developed a model, which included approaching elementary schools in Hamilton to see if they needed books. They were welcomed by W.H. Ballard, Dr. J.E. Davey, Gordon Price, Rousseau and Ray Lewis.
“Most of the books are going to classroom libraries for teachers, and then one of the schools, the librarian will take them,” explained Rajan, who lives in Dundas.
“School libraries have a budget, but they tend to put it into other resources,” noted Katherine.
The next steps were to create posters appealing for book donations and to pursue sponsorships. They were able to partner with Value Village’s community fundraiser program; they also received a donation of children’s books from the Dundas Museum, which was clearing out its collection. Mission Services in Dundas donated some of their extra books; other partners, such Pickwick Books in Waterdown, agreed to act as drop-off locations.
“It was a lot of networking, and a lot of community support,” said Katherine.
They also had a lot of support from family; the Rajans’ basement and garage served as temporary storage for all of the books, and both girls’ parents helped out with the driving.
“We couldn’t have done it without them,” said Katherine.
They also got a lot of support from their school, with St. Mary’s students donating a whopping 1,000 books.
The most labour-intensive aspect of the project came once the books were collected: they organized them by grade level, then, to ensure they tracked all their data for their DECA report that will be presented in February, they catalogued each item manually. The plan was to have the books delivered to the five schools early in the new year.
They also have to produce a 20-page report for their DECA project, and prepare a presentation to deliver at the provincial competition in Toronto on Feb. 6.
Katherine and Rajan say working on the Pocket Library Project not only improved their communication and project management skills, but also helped them step out of their comfort zone.
“We definitely started Grade 9 kind of as the shy girls, so we did not talk to people,” said Rajan, who plans to study accounting. “This project really helped us get out there and start talking to people, calling people, really putting ourselves out there.”
“Especially since we were passionate about this project, so it wasn't like it was a chore,” added Katherine.
They have some advice for anyone who might be thinking about doing a project of this size.
“Definitely, organization,” said Katherine. “There's a lot of moving parts behind the scenes that a lot of people don't really understand. And a lot of things can go wrong.”
“Give yourself a lot of grace room,” added Rajan. “If you think it’s going to take four months, give yourself eight months.
“And we had to rely a lot on other people as well, more than we thought we would, so our sponsors and our schools and our community. So honestly, we're super grateful for everyone who's helped us out with this.”
