JOHANNESBURG (2019)
In honor of World Book Day, we celebrated with Orange Grove Primary School in Johannesburg as part of our ongoing campaign to assist young readers with access to books. Through discussions with the school’s volunteer librarian, we learned that each class typically lines up outside the library during breaks to borrow a book. We donated more than 600 books, as well as treats for everyone, and we committed to installing new bookshelves in their library. World Book Day, of course, wouldn’t be complete without authors, and we were joined by author/illustrator combo Elaine Macdonald and Vanessa Mearns (I See an Elephant) as well as author Refiloe Moahloli (How Many Ways Can You Say Hello?), who came to read to the students.
AUSTRALIA (2019)
In the lead-up to Puffin’s 80th anniversary in 2020, we awarded $100,000 to 54 bookshops to help nurture young readers in their communities. Bookshops were invited to submit proposals for programs they would like to start in their communities, and the winning bookshops received funding between $500 and $5,000. Standouts included Puffin Poetry workshops in western Australia, a Books for Blokes reading club encouraging dads to read to kids in Queensland, a program helping prison moms read to their kids in New South Wales, prizes for readers in kids’ book clubs, revamped kids’ sections in stores, readers’ hubs for regional schools, street libraries, author visits, and many more. To learn more about the program and our winners, click here and here.
CAPETOWN (2019)
We celebrated Nelson Mandela International Day at Stars of Joy Educare, a nursery in a low- to middle-income suburb of Cape Town. Stars of Joy Educare provides an alternative to parents in need, offering very low application fees and accommodating up to 25 children between the ages of 2 and 5. In addition to volunteering, we donated children’s titles ranging from popular fairy tales to educational titles. Because the event took place in the winter, we also donated 25 new mattresses and thermal blankets. Stars of Joy has a team of unemployed mothers and grandmothers who volunteer their time, and we invited them to join in the celebration, sponsoring a tea-and-cake affair for everyone.
SPAIN (2019)
To celebrate International Book Day, we hosted a Readathon that challenged people to read or listen to a book and log their minutes. For every 10 minutes of reading, we donated a book to Save the Children, for up to 300,000 minutes—or 30,000 book donations. We encouraged readers to share how they were participating in our Readathon using the hashtag #MaratónDeLectura and to challenge their family and friends to participate as well. To learn more about the campaign, click here.
In November 2016, Penguin Random House Ireland entered into a three-year partnership with Fighting Words, a creative writing organization established by Roddy Doyle and Sean Love in 2009. This built on a wider long-term partnership between Penguin Random House U.K. and Ministry of Stories.
Fighting Words aims to help children and young people, and adults who did not have the opportunity as children, to discover and harness the power of their own imaginations and creative writing skills. Each year of the partnership, they produced an anthology of creative writing, which our editors helped to edit and our Communications team helped to publicize. We also set up author visits to schools in order to mentor students and provide tips and insight to improve their writing.
INDIA (2018)
To celebrate 30 years of Penguin in India, we initiated the Penguin Readathon and Book Gifting Journey. We worked with 30 partners from a range of groups—community libraries, shelter homes, independent bookstores, organizations that work with people with disabilities, prisons, and more—to expand the reach of books and reading to diverse communities and audiences. We selected our partners for the role they play in bringing the joy of reading to their communities. To learn more about the campaign, click here.
NEW DELHI (2018)
We celebrated International Literacy Day in 2018 by taking the opportunity to promote reading, writing, and creativity with 14 events spread over two days. We held a short-story competition to encourage in-house talent, and employees from DK India visited young cancer patients at a children’s hospital in New Delhi, spending time painting and drawing with the children, reading to them, and gifting them books in Hindi. We also donated office and writing materials to the Love Care Foundation and Aarambh aid organizations, both of which help underprivileged children.
CHINA (2019)
In June 2019, we donated reading corners called “magic book houses” to the impoverished region of Hainan province for students to have access to books and safe spaces to read. In addition, we donated 30 sets of the Magic Tree House series and other books, as well as 20 computers, to more than 300 students at Shuimanxiang Primary School.
CHINA (2018)
To celebrate the 5-year anniversary of Penguin Random House, we hosted a book drive, collecting a total of 733 books. We donated the books to the Library Project, an nonprofit dedicated to improving literacy among children in rural Asia, specifically China, Cambodia, and Vietnam, by donating books (in local languages) and shelving to build libraries in schools of need. The Library Project also provides support and training for teachers, to help them maximize use of their libraries and encourage children to read more. To learn more about the Library Project, click here.
CANADA (2019)
In our ongoing partnership with First Book Canada, we donated more than 200,000 books in the first half of 2019 to support youth in underserved communities across Canada. At the end of the year, we launched our holiday book-matching campaign that ran from Giving Tuesday to December 31, 2019. For every $4 donation, we donated one book, up to a total of 20,000 books, providing twice as many books to children in need. To learn more about our end-of-year campaign, click here.
