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We know that access to books – in all forms – is critical for children to develop into readers.

Now, through a new White House-led initiative, First Book is helping connect children in need across the country with access to thousands of e-books. The initiative, announced today by President Obama, is part of a broad effort to ignite kids’ love of reading by improving access to digital content and public libraries.

Through the initiative, called Open eBooks, publishers are providing $250 million worth of e-books for free to children from low-income families. 10,000 of their most popular titles will be included.

The books will be accessible through an Open eBooks app, which is currently being developed by the New York Public Library, the Digital Public Library of America and the Institute of Museum and Library Services. Once complete, the app and all the e-books will be available to programs and classrooms serving children in need through First Book.

Know someone working in the lives of children in need? Encourage them to sign up with First Book.

The post First Book Joins White House to Bring Thousands of e-Books to Kids in Need appeared first on First Book Blog.

Invariably, when people learn about First Book and our mission of getting new books to kids in need, someone always asks: “What about electronic readers and ebooks? Why don’t you distribute those to kids from low-income families?”

Good idea! We’re pleased to announce that we are now able to offer over fifty electronic titles on the First Book Marketplace (our online store available exclusively to programs serving kids in need).

The titles are all from Britannica Educational Publishing, the folks who publish the famed Encylopaedia Britannica, and they cover topics ranging from sharks to space exploration. Each title also includes a “preview” option, so that teachers and program leaders can take a look at the content before they buy it.

We’re excited to offer these eBooks to the programs in the First Book network, and this is just the first of many steps we’re taking into the world of digital books and resources.

I am thrilled to announce the dawn of a new era at First Book:  the official debut of our brand-new website!

Our old site had reached “vintage” status, so we hope you will find our new site faster, easier to navigate and much more useful. (We think it’s pretty nice to look at, too!)

I especially love our new video, The Story of First Book, with starring roles by some of our favorite authors, including Mo Willems, friend to pigeons everywhere.

Read more about our impact , our outstanding partners, and how we continue to innovate.  First Book is helping guide the publishing industry and giving heroic educators greater choice and voice in the books and learning resources available to them like never before.

If you are a teacher or you know of a group that serves kids in need – from birth to age 18 – it is easy to tap into First Book’s resources . With a growing inventory of top-quality books at prices 50% – 90% below retail, our revolutionary online bookstore, the First Book Marketplace, makes books affordable to schools and programs serving kids in need.

I invite you to make a donation to support First Book’s mission – every $2 pays for a brand-new book for a child in need.

Our web site is just one sign of many exciting things to come.  We’re testing e-books now with plans to provide reading resources in new formats and technologies.  We are working to make sure that children from low-income families are not left on the other side of the digital divide.

Please let your friends and social networks know about First Book.

If you’re on Twitter, tweet about us to five friends and ask them to do the same.  Here’s a sample message: Check out @FirstBook ‘s new website! http://www.firstbook.org

If you’re on Facebook, “like” us  and post this update to your status: Check out First Book’s new website! http://www.firstbook.org

And let me know what you think of our new site.  I’d love to hear from you!

Thank you,

Kyle Zimmer
President and CEO, First Book

Pi Beta Phi is one of First Book’s strongest partners; they have worked with us since 2007, and their generosity and dedication have helped us get new books into the hands of thousands of kids from low-income communities.

Recently, Pi Beta Phi issued a challenge that was as easy as 3-4-5: If they could reach 3,000 followers on Twitter and we could get 4,000 followers on Twitter, they would donate funds to provide 5,000 brand-new books to kids in need.  (At the time, we had about 3,400 followers, so it seemed like an easy enough goal to reach.)

We threw the challenge out to our tweeps, and they really delivered! People don’t always have the time or resources to help in big ways, so they sometimes respond enthusiastically when given the chance to help in smaller ways. Many of our followers re-tweeted the request, but many more went above and beyond the call of duty, sending it individually to popular or influential friends of theirs on Twitter.

* Whoa, you lost me, First Book. For those of you not on Twitter, you can think of it as a network of overlapping circles. If we “tweet” something (post it to the First Book account on Twitter), all of our “followers” (the people who sign up to receive our comments) can see it on their own Twitter page. They can then “re-tweet” it, and share it with their own circle of friends and followers, sometimes adding a comment of their own. So the more a message is shared, the more people see it.

We even picked up a couple celebrity followers – Alyssa Milano and Kirstie Alley. Both of whom – in addition to being lovely, talented and strong supporters of community service organizations – have huge followings on Twitter. Like, hundreds-of-thousands-of-people huge, all of whom were able to see the re-tweeted challenge.

Thanks to the efforts of our many dedicated online supporters, we hit 4,000 followers quickly, and kept going. At present, we’re up to 5,800, and Pi Beta Phi will be donating the funds to purchase 5,000 brand-new books for kids in need.

As we say on Twitter: First Book supporters FTW!

Thanks to the Cheerios® Read-A-Thon, now when you read together with your child, you can help provide a new book to a child in need. Through the Read-A-Thon, Cheerios is encouraging individuals to pledge to read to your kids for at least 15 minutes a day by today, March 15th.

If they reach their goal of 6 million reading moments pledged by the end of the day, Cheerios will donate 250,000 books to First Book to benefit the kids who need them most.

Visit Cheerios on Facebook and select “Get Started” to make your pledge today!

First Book is excited to be one of 50 cause-related charities showcased in this year’s Members Project intiative from American Express and TakePart.  Participants to the site can vote once a week for a charity, and every three months, the charity that garners the most votes will win $200,000.

For First Book, this funding would provide 100,000 new books to kids living in high poverty communities throughout the U.S.

We applaud American Express and TakePart for taking corporate social responsibility to a new level.  Not only is the funding commitment important, but participants will be able to engage more fully with the featured causes.  After voting for First Book, TakePart.com’s social advocacy platform will allow you to connect with other like-minded participants online and find literacy-related volunteer opportunities in your community.   It’s corporate responsibility 2.0.

Please help First Book reach more kids with wonderful new books. Visit www.takepart.com/membersproject and cast your vote for First Book!

Our own social entrepreneur and founder, Kyle Zimmer, joined world leaders in Davos for the World Economic Forum last week. She presented an IdeasLab primer on the First Book Marketplace, in a session moderated by J. Gregory Dees, Professor, Practice of Social Entrepreneurship, Fuqua School of Business, Duke. Watch the presentation below and read more about Kyle’s inspiration for First Book after the jump.

Kyle’s mission is not to fight illiteracy but to end it. She began First Book in 1992 in Washington DC when she realized that children in low-income situations have little or no access to books or reading material. In fact, studies show that in middle-income neighborhoods the ratio of books to children is 13 to one, but in low-income neighborhoods, the ratio is 1 book for every 300 children.

According to esteemed researcher, Susan Neuman, Ph.D. University of Michigan, “Access to books and educational material is the single biggest barrier to literacy development in the United States and beyond. If we can solve the problem of access, we will be well on the road to realizing educational parity – a goal which has eluded this country for generations.”

The First Book Marketplace (FBMP) is designed to aggregate an untapped market to provide a steady stream of high-quality books at an affordable price for the first time ever to programs serving children in low-income situations, revolutionizing the way teachers and program leaders can educate these underserved children. At scale, the FBMP becomes self-sustainable and poised to deliver educational books and materials, including digital resources, globally.

Kyle didn’t rest after she found one way to deliver millions of books to children in need through the First Book National Book Bank; she created a true social innovation in the First Book Marketplace and she aims to deliver access to educational resources to the world.

We congratulate Kyle on her success at the World Economic Forum and on delivering nearly 70 million books to children in need.

Looking for a great way to raise money for a great cause such as First Book?  Several bloggers will be raising money for First Book in the upcoming Blogathon, to take place on July 25th, 2009.  If you are unfamiliar with what a Blogathon is, it’s essentially like a marathon without the running part. Blogathon 2009 is a 24 hour event during which participants blog every half hour to raise money for the charity of their choice.

So what brought bloggers to support First Book? One of our blog supporters, Erica Watson, from the Quirky Charm blog, had a chance to tell us all about her love for books.  “Books played a huge roll in my childhood. They were cherished friends who gave me comfort, joy, and adventure. Reading is still dear to my heart, fiction to non-fiction and everything in between,” she says.

Through Erica’s love for books, she has a vast awareness for the need to put books in the hands of all children. “A good book can make all the difference on a tough day. Through books we can relate to people through time and space. Books can reassure us, they can guide us, they can give us inspiration. It breaks my heart that there are so many who don’t know this simple pleasure, especially children,” she mentions.

With your help, and the support of bloggers like Erica, First Book can provide even more books to the kids who need them most. If you would like to support Erica in her blogging efforts, please visit her at Quirky Charm.  To learn more about participating in Blogathon, please visit the official Blogathon 2009 site.

Stay connected to all that’s happening at First Book by following us on Twitter – a site for friends, family and fans to communicate and stay connected through the exchange of quick, frequent answers to one simple question: What are you doing?

Our resident tweeters, Aesah, Joan, Linda and Nisha, will keep you up to date on the latest First Book happenings as well as book news and articles.

So what are you waiting for? Follow us @firstbook.

In an effort to serve our Recipient Groups better the First Book Help Team is proud to unveil a brand new Web page for organizations serving children in need.

The Recipient Group Online Resource Center, found at http://www.firstbook.org/rg, is a gateway to all of First Book’s resources and literacy campaigns including links to register and update your information with First Book, purchase the latest award-winning books at 50-85% off list price on the First Book Marketplace, and access news about the first Book Bank distribution of 2009 (which will be announced via email to registered First Book Recipient Groups in the first quarter of 2009).

We hope the Recipient Group Online Resource Center makes it easier for you to help your kids be enthusiastic about reading in 2009!