Library Update 4

Over the past 9 months the library has changed, grown, and improved. When my mom came to visit in August, the team brought a number of books that had been ordered. Other people as well have brought books down. We now have 740 books in the library!!! Thank you to Hope for cataloguing them all! These include picture books, levelled readers, novels, devotional books, science non-fiction books, science experiment idea books, and various other books. The problem now is there isn't enough shelf space. Many of these books are sitting in boxes because the one book shelf that there is, is not big enough to hold them all, even with many of them lent out.

It is great to see that many teachers have been borrowing books to use in their classes, or devotional books for personal study. Thank you to Ruth for being in charge of the library, which is currently in the sponsorship office in Chamche. Unfortunately the sponsorship office is only open Monday to Friday mornings, which is exactly when all the elementary school teachers work. This may be one reason why books are not being returned. This is of increasing importance as the school year ends for the 2 month vacation. To try and work out both of these problems, we have decided that it is best if teachers borrow books as a school, rather than individually. That way the secretaries can return the books on their photocopy day. Thank you to Miriam, the secretary in Chamche, who receives returned books outside of library hours.

Before I left Canada, a member of my church, Jose, offered to ask his family in Mexico to collect used Spanish books for the library here in Guatemala. Thank you to Jose for that offer. We are still trying to figure out the best way to make this happen. While here, I get my mail (normally just cards), sent to the Peters' house, and their address is merely a highway marking. I would not trust the postal systems in Central America, however, to deliver a valuable box of books to Tactic. Thankfully one of Les's contacts at Seteca in Guatemala City has agreed to have the books delivered to the seminary, which has an actual postal address. Now we are trying to figure out if it is worth it cost-wise to send a box of books by mail from Mexico to Guatemala, or if will cost more than the books are worth. We might have to wait until someone drives down, through Mexico, to Guatemala for those books to be brought here. All of this is still in the works.  

I am excited to watch how the library has grown over the course of this year. Of course with any new endeavor, the bugs need to be worked out. But I am excited to see how the library will continue to change over the next school year, and to see borrowing and using books within and outside the classroom becoming a regular habit for the teachers and students in these schools. The more people use these books, the greater the blessing will be to them. Already though, many teachers and children have been blessed by the books in this library. Thank you to everyone who donated money to make this possible.

Some students from Chamche enjoying a library book

What to choose, what to choose?