Beverly Sanders saw the rewards of hard work when a young boy approached her after her presentation of books for the Book in Every Home program.

He was showing me the book, and he asked me to read the title to him, Sanders said. He said that the book sounded good and then said, I can take it home, too.’

Sanders is sponsoring the program for all SIU campuses.

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The Book in Every Home program ended its third annual book drive Nov. 21. The drive collects books to be distributed to the children in Head Start schools. Head Start Schools focus on meeting the social, educational and physical needs of preschool children in low-income families.

The intent of the program is to provide children in Head Start to fourth grade with books. Each child is provided with one book to keep.

The program relies on donations of books from local communities.

Throughout December, Sanders will deliver the books and a short presentation to the SIU-affiliated Head Start Schools.

Sanders speaks with the children about various different topics.

We tell the children that people at the University want them to read a lot and very well, Sanders said. We encourage them to think of the future and to plan to go to college.

Sanders became involved two years ago when she saw the success of the program.

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I was so impressed with the program, she said. I just wanted to get involved.

About 3,500 books were collected for the program, 1,000 of which came from the Carbondale campus.

Books given to children are placed in a lending library, and the children in Head Start can read them in class or take them home.

Sanders also reminds the children about the importance about taking care of books.

We tell the children the only place to write in a book is to put our name in it, she said. And if they write in a book or cut out pages, they can never finish the story.

Various campus location had places to drop off the books, which were then collected and labeled by about 70 Saluki Volunteers.

Kathy Lorentz, coordinator of Student Development, appreciated the help of the students and said there was more student involvement than in past years.

Sanders says that although there were not as many books that were collected in the past, she was still satisfied with the total number.

Lorentz said she has thought about changes for next year that will enhance the program.

I’d like to work with individual student organizations more, she said. I’d like to have individual organizations participate in drives to provide more books.