“Expanding classroom libraries, one birthday at a time!”

Established in 1998

By Brittany Turner

Mission Statement

The Happy Birthday Book Foundation is dedicated to helping give underprivileged children the opportunity to donate a book of their choice to their classroom libraries on their birthday. With this goal in mind, classroom libraries will expand nationwide as young children learn the extreme importance of giving back to their community.

Why was The Happy Birthday Book Foundation created?

At the age of 11, I attended a cash-strapped local  elementary school. Every time I wanted to read a book, I noticed the bookshelves were half empty and there were very few books for my classmates and I to choose from. I believe that reading is a very important part of a growing child’s education, and no child should ever be denied the privilege of reading. Understandably, many underprivileged schools do not have the funds to provide a wide variety of books for their students. In many occasions, teachers themselves are then forced to take money out of their own pockets to fill their classroom’s shelves. On December 11th, 1998 (my birthday) I decided to take it upon myself and make my classrooms library bigger. So I went with my mom to the bookstore and we picked out my favorite book and donated it to my classroom for all of my classmates to enjoy also. Then I thought, if all of my 30 classmates donated a book on their birthdays also, our classroom library would grow 30 books a year! That is when I decided to create the Happy Birthday Book Foundation, “Expanding classroom libraries one birthday at a time!”

How It Works

With the help from The Happy Birthday Book Foundation, each child is given the opportunity to expand their classroom library by leaving their favorite book behind for their classmates - and the next grade -  to enjoy. First the student chooses their favorite book. Then they are provided with a customized book plate to insert on the inside cover of their book donation. The book plate has a space to put each child’s name, birth date, their grade, and what they liked about that book inside. The child then places their newly customized book onto their classrooms bookshelf. Soon every classroom in the entire school will be filled with hundreds of hand picked books to for every child to enjoy. As the students grow older each year, they’ll return to their elementary classrooms and see their book still being enjoyed by younger children. They’ll learn that giving back to their community is very important, and realize that they’ve contributed to the education of the next generation.

HBB Book Day

The Happy Birthday Book Foundation recognizes that some birthdays fall on days when school is not in session or certain religions do not allow children to have yearly “birthday celebrations.” This is why we’ve created “A Very Merry UN-Birthday-Day”. On December 11th of each year, every child who wants to join, can still celebrate “HBB Book Day” and donate their favorite books all at once! No child will ever be denied the opportunity to further their education with The Happy Birthday Book Foundation.

Our Ultimate Goal

The Foundations ultimate goal is to expand classroom libraries worldwide, but we’re taking it one step at a time; school by school, child-by-child, birthday-by-birthday! Even if HBBF isn’t in every school yet, children who hear about the Foundation can still go online to our website and print off their own book plate and donate their Favorite book their classroom library. One day soon we hope that The Happy Birthday Book Foundation will sweep the world by surprise, and every child in every school will be right with reading opportunities, and will have the opportunity to get the same incredible education. The process will continue until all classrooms have SO many wonderful books, that the teachers won’t know what to do with them!

Recently Brittany was a guest on The Doctors TV show due to an unusual birth anomaly. See video below.

http://www.kusi.com/home/82616997.html?video=pop&t=a

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