ILI Quarterly Review: Letter from the Team

Hello I.L.I. community,

My name is Madeline Antony, and as the co-founder of I.L.I I wanted to give a quick summary of what we have accomplished as a community thus far – and what is coming next for I.L.I. We are coming up on our three month anniversary at the end of September and here is a quarterly review:

• We have raised a total of $2629.00!!!!!!
• We held an art raffle, with eight amazing artists which raised $700.00 of our total funds
• We were featured in the Calgary Herald and Global News
• We interviewed two local authors
• Most importantly, we purchased 465 books for local schools, with more on the way!

So what is next for I.L.I? First, we want to thank every single person who has donated to, or spread the word about our organization. We could not have done any of this amazing list of accomplishments without your generous support and we hope to continue to help bring diversity and representation into classroom libraries across Calgary. Secondly, we have some short term plans and long term goals for where I.L.I is headed:

Short Term Plans

• Due to the confusion Covid has caused particularly with the start of the school year we are only completing one full school donation, which will be going to Bowcroft elementary. The remainder of our donations will be done through a nomination system directed at individual teachers. The nomination form is available on our website and can be completed by anyone who knows a K-6 teacher who could use a package of books donated from our organization.
• Our first avenue for physical book donation is opening up in collaboration with Shelf Life Books and the Next Page. Anyone who wishes to make a specific book donation to our cause can visit Shelf Life Books and the Next Page, and purchase one of the suggested books to then be donated to I.L.I. Check out our blog posts about this on our website to learn more and to view the book list.
• A second art raffle is being organized for the month of December. Any artists who wish to contribute, we would love your support and you can reach us at [email protected].

Future Goals

• As our name suggests, we are striving for inclusive literature and as we expand, we hope to expand the groups that we can help represent in classroom literature. This includes those who are disabled, those from the LGBTQ+ community, women, marginalized genders, individuals whose first language is not English and beyond. Inclusive is an intersectional term and we want our organization to reflect that.

• New and exciting fundraising opportunities. We want to be able to give something back for the generosity we receive, and we would love to partner with more local companies.
• Development of online resources, such as read-alongs, teaching seminars and general anti-discriminatory resources for education to supplement the literature we focus on.
• Being Calgary based and elementary school focused has been a great experience so far, however we would love to expand into higher grade levels, other cities, and institutions that are not schools, such as daycare’s, woman and homeless shelters, and hospitals.
• Finally, we want to be able to continue bringing the stories, the voices, and the perspectives that are often overlooked and under represented to the young minds who will help shape our future.

I hope this helped clarify who we are, what we have done thus far and what we want to do in the future. Thank you for being a part of this movement and for supporting our charity. If you have any questions, suggestions or comments feel free to reach out at [email protected].

Cheers,

Madeline Antony