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 Welcome
to Thai Book Drive!
(A Registered Not-For-Profit
Company under IRS Section 501(c)(3))
View the
feature on Thai Book Drive that appeared on NBC's Prime Time on September 3,
2007
Thai Book Drive,
Inc. has now completed its third
year of operations and we are pleased to have collected over 200,000
school books from generous donors, find sponsors to ship these books to Thailand
and have hand delivered these books to every elementary school in
the impoverished Sisaket Province of Northeast Thailand.
.
The origin of Thai Book Drive:
Thai Book Drive was
founded by myself, Andrew Titley, in late 2004 when I was a 16 year old 11th
Grade student at Oceanside High School in New York. During
August 2004, I had the opportunity of visiting a small village that
is located near Sisaket – approximately 50 miles from both the Laos
and Cambodian borders with the nearest town of any size being Ubon
Ratchathani. This village is impoverished with the sole source
of income coming from rice fields. Very few of the houses have
electricity, telephones, in-door toilets or other amenities that we
are used to.
.
I visited the local
elementary school where there were 6 classes of children aged from 4 to 10 years
old. Each of these classes had about 30 students and all of the students
are required to learn English. Although the Thai government supplies each
student with a uniform, the students have very few books in English and those
they have are worn out, shared between students and are not the most appropriate
for them to use to learn a different language. I told the teachers that I
would do my best to obtain books for them. Thai Book Drive is the result of
this.
.
Thai Book Drive is my own personal idea and, apart from sponsors, donors
and more recently, my brother, Trevor,
there is no other organization or person assisting me with this
project. 100% of all donations are be used for this project.
.
The first
three years of Thai Book Drive (2004-2007)
During 2004-2005, I
collected over 65,000 elementary school books from
schools, libraries and individual donors throughout New York State.
Several shipping companies were kind enough to sponsor the transportation of
these books to the major city in Issan, Ubon Ratchathani.
I spent the months of July and August 2005 living in Sisaket Province. With the
help of the Regional Education Department, I was able to visit each of the 64
schools in the Province and hand delivered these books to these schools. When visiting each of the schools, I was able to meet with over 700 teachers
and, in each case, he also had the opportunity to give presentations to over
12,000 students. During these presentations, I also stressed the importance of
education in general and specially learning to read, write and speak English.
In every instance, the schools were highly grateful for the book donations and
also for having the opportunity of letting me address the students. Many
teachers commented on how my presentation was able to affect the students – most
of whom have never seen, let alone met a foreigner. Being able to visit these
children personally and live among the Thai people, I believe that my impact has
effected them personally to learn English more seriously. Because of my
age and fun activities, I confidently believe that my presence among them has
given them the ability and desire to learn more. My importance of keeping
the English curriculum in their school's for hopes that it will lead to a better
life has been upheld.
During 2005-2006, as
a
12th grade student at Oceanside High School, I was elected to Student President
but despite my hectic schedule, I was able to ship 50,000+ school books,
computers and supplies. I again spent the months of July and August 2006 living
in Sisaket Province hand delivering books to schools and talking with the
students and teachers. Once again I was welcomed in many schools and the books
were received with enormous thanks.
 A special thanks
once again to Richard Bolte, President of
BDP
International for supplying us another freight container to
send books to Thailand. Without help from this most
generous freight forwarder in the previous years, our book drive
would not have been able to conduct nearly as much donations as
we have. Due to poor planning on our behalf, the shipment arrived late from New York but
we were still able to get the job done with some changes and innovation.
Rather than visiting each school individually, we stationed ourselves at
"Network" schools. Each day of donating, we went to a different "Network"
school and all the schools within that area visited us and received the donated
books. So, rather than visiting schools individually, we visited one
particular school but still managed to donate to between 8 and 15 schools in a
day. Due to the lack of time, this was the most efficient way of donating
books and we still managed to speak to all the students who attended my
presentation on the importance of English in their education. To date, all
expenses relating to Thai Book Drive have been borne by myself, personally. I
have spent over $3,000 for travel to Thailand, accommodations and living
expenses for 2 months and employing the services of a driver and a translator.
I have financed this by working on a part-time basis during the winter months as
an Assistant Manager in a restaurant.
The 2006-2007
project has just been completed with another 60,000 school books being hand
delivered to schools. I was initially concerned about this year project as
I am currently an 18 year old undergraduate student attending the University of
St Andrews in Scotland, United Kingdom studying International Relations and
Management. I had to rely on my younger brother, Trevor, to assist me in
coordinating book donation and pickups. However I am pleased to advise
that Trevor was not only successful in is efforts but that he joined me for a
month in Thailand to help with distribution and delivery. My sincere
thanks to Lynda Frazier at International Book Project for their generous
donation of brand new books which were delivered at the start of this project.
In addition, Trevor and I were
accompanied by news agency NBC for a few days to
witness first hand the impact the books have had on communities
in Sisaket and Ubon Ratchathani. In the near future, we
can expect to see our efforts broadcasted on television to an
American audience. Our hope is that this will generate
support, donations and assistance with our book drive. During the summer of
2007, I also gained an accredited TESOL diploma backed by
Chichester College in England which is recognized worldwide the world and will
help enormously with my efforts.
The Future - Fourth
year of the book drive (2007-2008)
Thai
Book Drive is now well established with Trevor in the USA and myself
in the UK. We are continuing our goal of donating books and
now computers. If any business, corporation or personal donors
have computers that they wish to donate, please do not hesitate to
contact me or Trevor via email. We are also still in need of
funding to date to defray the expenses of this project - most of our
expenses are out of pocket. We expect 2007-2008
to be our biggest year to date. Thanks to the New Hyde Park-Garden City Park
School District, we have amassed two full garage-sized
containers prior to even the start of the new school year. This has forced us to prematurely get
ready for sending a shipment of books to Thailand before our
typical time of around May 2008.
Now in my second year of
Being based in Scotland, I will also be developing
Anglo Thai
Cultural Exchange
during 2007-2008. Building upon the
ideals of Thai Book Drive, this newly formed Scottish Charity will
be finding volunteers students to do "homestays" in Thailand to help
teach English. Starting during the summer of 2008, our hope is
that UK University students, during either their gap year or summer
break, will venture to Thailand to teach English on a volunteer
basis. Apart from being a native-English speaker, there are very few
requirements needed and I encourage all to consider it. The
experience you will receive from it, I guarantee, will be with you
for the rest of your life. Along with my studies, I will also be
visiting Universities throughout Scotland and England looking for
British students interested in teaching English on a volunteer
basis. Help will be needed when visiting the universities.
If anyone is attending one of the universities that I will be
visiting, please do send me an email as it would be most
appreciated. A list of universities that will be visited can
be found at
www.SupportATCE.org.
Donations & Sponsorship
Thai Book Drive,
Inc. is "not-for-profit corporation" and received has “Recognition
of Exemption under Section 501c (3) of the Internal Revenue Code”.
Neither Trevor, I nor my 3 Directors/Trustees receive any
compensation from this corporation. All services are be performed
on a voluntary, unpaid basis.
If you
have any schoolbooks, school supplies, computers and/or printers,
please contact me by email at
info@ThaiBookDrive.com.
We will arrange for pick-up.
If you would like to make a financial donation, please make checks
payable to “Thai Book Drive, Inc.” and mail to 327 Dennis St,
Oceanside. NY 11572.
Thank you
to all who have made Thai Book Drive the success that it has become.....
Andrew
Titley, Jr.
"If education is the road out of poverty, books are the wheels
needed for the journey."
Richard Crabbe, Chairman, African Publishers Network, 1997-2002
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