Volunteers eventually stopped counting the books and just counted the boxes of books. More than 50 parcels of texts were packed up this past week and will soon be handed out to students in schools in West Africa.
Duchess Park secondary school teacher Gerry Chidiac heard from his students (especially Kendra Kipping) in spring that the surplus chalk boards from the condemned old DPSS should be salvaged and shipped to Africa. The students had heard of a pro-education initiative there from a guest speaker in their Cultures In Conflict 12 class, Saah Joseph, who was a survivor of the recent atrocities in West Africa and was a child soldier in that conflict. He is now a leader in restoring schools in places like Sierra Leone, Liberia and Ivory Coast.
Local relief worker Allison Fedorkiw, who is in that region right now on a repeat visit, was the one who brought Saah to Prince George.
It was Kipping again who brought up the idea of sending books, too.
"They are surplus books the school district has because new editions have come out. They are a little bit older but still perfectly good and would have just gone to recycling otherwise," Chidiac said. "We are helping rebuild a couple of countries torn apart by a civil war for many years; it makes a huge difference. Once again, it was all because a student came to me and said 'why don't we do this?' just like the chalk boards."
The boxes are filled with novels, math books, teacher resource books, texts for kids aged elementary through secondary levels.
The Nechako Rotary Club aided in the collection of the books, and the storage of the boxes at the Art Knapp's Plantland warehouse until enough donated goods had accumulated to fill a shipping container. There are also separate initiatives in the area collecting medical supplies, sewing machines and other amenities for the impoverished communities in the West African sector the Rotary Club is focused on.
"We have a lot of work to do in the world, but I can see the day when we do not have genocide happening anymore, I don't think I am being naive," said Chidiac. "All these donations and programs and the awareness being generated is interconnected. There are crises, yes, but there are people who are out there working at it, doing amazing work, and look what's being done just from this one city. It is really exciting. It will make a difference. I have been doing this work since the Cold War, and I have seen a real change. It is a new world, a world where things are starting to change for the better, and it is young people who are getting involved in so much of it."
