By Andrew Martins, Managing Editor
A group of preschoolers recently completed their first major charitable donation, as they joined with other kids around the state to donate thousands of books to the Bridge of Books Foundation., Since the beginning of the year, students at The Goddard School in Hillsborough coordinated with their teachers and family members in order to collect the new and gently used books., “This is a community that places so much importance on education and I think they really appreciate what they have here,” Tim Hoy, the director of operations at the Hillsborough branch of The Goddard School said. “I think that translates so when an opportunity like this arrives, the community knows what that means to help provide others with that chance.”, More than 12,000 books were ultimately collected by youths at ten locations of The Goddard School throughout the Skylands Region. Other participating schools included locations in Branchburg, Clinton, Denville, Flanders, Flemington, Florham Park, Parsippany, Sparta and Randolph., In Hillsborough, the local children were able to collect more than 1,500 books of varying genres and reading skill levels., To help motivate the kids, Hoy said the school used graphs in its common area to showcase their progress and offered incentives like pasta parties and other special events once certain milestones were met., “The kids really took ownership of this and ran with it,” he said., Over the course of the drive, the kids helped adults sort the litany of literature in preparation for their delivery to the Bridge of Books Foundation in Rumson., According to the foundation’s website, Bridge of Books works to “get as many books as possible into the hands of New Jersey’s underserved children.”, “The districts that these books are going to, children jsut don’t necessarily have early access to literacy,” Hoy said. “We’re lucky in Hillsborough where reading and literacy and early technology is part of the daily routine here.”, Books donated to the foundation go toward reading programs that take place throughout the year, with previous donations going to communities in Asbury, Keansburg, Cumberland, Camden, Trenton, Newark and East Orange., After the books were tallied and packaged for delivery to the foundation, Hoy said it took him and his father four trips in a large truck to get everything to where it needed to go., The drive ultimately culminated in an Open House event at the Hillsborough school on Feb. 11, giving families a chance to see the good that its students were able to do while learning., Over the course of the day, the open house used a number of themes from popular children’s authors on display for the more than 100 people who showed up. Local non-fiction author Lyn Sirota was also on hand for readings., Looking forward, Hoy said this year’s successful drive may lead to more charitable efforts from the school and its kids in the future., “I think everyone was really happy with the outcome this year and as we meet up with the other schools that we worked with this time around, we’ll start to put an eye toward the future,” Hoy said.
