Better World Books
Drop off your unwanted books today at the NHCC bookstore's Better World Books Donation Box today!
Making the World Better with Books
On Tuesday, November 27, 2007, a newly formed partnership between Better World Books, The North Hennepin Community College (NHCC) Bookstore, the NHCC chapter of Phi Theta Kappa, and the NHCC Foundation yielded its first donation toward a new textbook scholarship for NHCC students with a $822.00 check.
Pictured left to right, (front) Tom Snorek, Amy Cloutier, Joe Crowe, Beth Frykman(back) Peggy LePage, Tom Curtis, DeeDee Heitzman, Matt Cici, Niko Tomlinson (Better World Books), Carole LaFleur
In 2003, the bookstore was shipping unsaleable books to the MN Department of Corrections libraries to benefit offender reading programs. Books can be recycled even when they have no more use on a college campus. “But it was costing us a lot in freight” said Tom Curtis, Freight & Website Associate for the Bookstore. “In 2004, I learned from a used book vendor, that Better World Books would take our unwanted books and pay the freight!” Better World Books has a special arrangement with UPS allowing them to offer free freight to the shipper of the donated books.
That was the beginning of a unique partnership with Better World Books and the campus Bookstore at NHCC. Since then the Bookstore has collected over seven tons of books for Better World Books. These books have benefited the literacy organization Good Books for Africa, located in St. Paul, MN. Not all the books go to Africa but to a warehouse in Wisconsin to be sorted, processed and evaluated for need overseas. Some books are resold on the Better World Books website. The money raised pays the fee to ship the containers to Africa. Books in poor condition are recycled.
In October 2006, discussions began between the NHCC campus Bookstore and Phi Theta Kappa’s local chapter at NHCC concerning a partnership in running used book drives. Phi Theta Kappa is an international honors society for two-year schools. It is the largest honors society in higher education in America. One of PTK’s goals is to recognize and encourage scholarship among two-year college students by providing opportunity for the development of leadership and service.
The idea of a textbook scholarship was not part of the original goal of recycling unwanted textbooks. When it was learned Better World Books would pay for collected books the idea soon developed of a textbook scholarship. The plan was to have the Bookstore and PTK coordinate the book drives. Since the NHCC College Foundation already processes and awards thousands of dollars in scholarships it made sense to involve them in facilitating the textbook scholarship.
The four partnering organizations contribute and benefit from working together to help others and the environment. The Bookstore is pleased to coordinate efforts to collect so many unwanted books. PTK students are happy to be contributing time toward higher literacy rates around the world. The Foundation is thrilled to be able to provide more scholarships to students. And Better World Books is glad to have received over 2200 books!