By Afsaneh Faki | Director of Finance
With the support of GlobalGiving and Colgate’s generous grants, this past year, Ballet and Books has seen exponential growth and some big wins. With 8 chapters nationwide, we’ve been able to help over 300 children find a love of reading through dance and engage almost just as many high school/college student mentors in developing professionally and personally by giving back to their communities.
Spring and Summer of 2022 has been an extra exciting time for Ballet and Books.
Four of our chapters (Berkeley, UCLA, Ithaca, and Princeton) held year-end recitals where their 3-to-9-year old mentees performed on university stages. For many of our children, it was their first time performing at an event of that scale. Their friends and families were given free admission to come watch and support their young students. Each chapter expressed how impactful that experience was for their mentees.
We continue to grow with a new chapter starting this fall at the University of Virginia. Each new chapter is a new community of students who will finally get access to a free literacy and dance program. This brings us one step closer to our goal of having a Ballet and Books chapter at every major university, reaching as many children across the nation as possible.
With the upcoming launch of our new children’s book, we’re excited to help hundreds more right in their own homes. Over the past two years, our team has been putting together a book, When We Read, that promotes the Ballet and Books curriculum and implements one of our core values, diversity, equity, and inclusion. This book is intended to bring Ballet and Books to students who may not have a chapter near them. We also plan to get When We Read into dance studios, along with our full curriculum, so that children from families who have the means to pay for a program like Ballet and Books also have access. Our official book launch starts tomorrow, July 1st!
Looking back on these past few years, we have come such a long way with the support of Colgate and GlobalGiving. As we look ahead to the future, we’re so excited to continue growing our impact and closing the literacy gap one community at a time. You have not only helped support us up until this point, but have also given us the resources to begin supporting ourselves moving forward. Ballet and Books would not be possible without you!
Links:
Project reports on GlobalGiving are posted directly to globalgiving.org by Project Leaders as they are completed, generally every 3-4 months. To protect the integrity of these documents, GlobalGiving does not alter them; therefore you may find some language or formatting issues.
If you donate to this project or have donated to this project, you can receive an email when this project posts a report. You can also subscribe for reports without donating.
