Education -
The Boxes of Books Project, which commenced in December 2009, has been greatly welcomed by the communities. Thanks to funding provided by the Japan National Council of Social Welfare (JNCSW), YUM is able to continue its impact on Central Kalimantan communities with the birth of a new project, The Integrated Literature Project, dedicated to improving the intellectual capacity of communities, whilst promoting a love for reading.
As part one of the two-part Literature Project, the Boxes of Books service provides access to reading materials including novels, school reference material, women's cook books, and tabloids for women, children, and youths living in the communities farthest away from YUM's Kalimantan Library Resource Centre.
"Our initial thought is that if they can't come to our library, then the library will come to them! These boxes of books have been placed in the care of women from the PKK, a volunteer organization aimed at community empowerment and family welfare.
"The books remain in each location for a month and are then rotated or replaced by a new box containing a variety of reading materials," explained pak Rusdi, Project Manager of YUM's Central Kalimantan office.
This is good! There needs to be this mobile library project of YUM as there are many children and mothers here who actually like to read; especially if there are school textbooks and cookbooks for mothers... There are many high school children around here, and I would love to encourage them to read!"
Ibu Yuliana (Secretary of the PPK Women (advocate) and the Posmaldes office)
YUM is excited to start work on the second part of the Literature Project, the Dayak Language Book Project. In 2010 YUM will work in cooperation with local authors in publishing a series of tri-language Dayak children's story books in Dayak, the native tongue of Central Kalimantan, as well as Indonesian and English.
The project will help to promote a love of books and an active reading culture from an early stage of a child's life, whether their mother tongue is Dayak, Indonesian, or English.
