The Kasiisi Project · Elizabeth Ross, Founder & Director · 64 Linnaean Street · Cambridge MA 01238 · USA · +1.617.493.5775
In summer 2009, Barbara Stevens worked with Kasiisi Primary School headmistress Lydiah Kasenene 
to open a lending library for students. This is the first such library among the hundreds of government-run primary schools in this district in western Uganda. Many people and organizations in the US and Uganda contributed resources and hard work to make the library a reality. Photos »
The school's secure library space had been used as a storeroom for years. We worked with the Ugandans to organize the thousand or so government-supplied curriculum and reading books plus several hundred donated books of all kinds. We also shipped 21 boxes with 1400 newly donated books from the US. Among them were encyclopedias, which were new to the Ugandan teachers and students, and which were found immediately to be invaluable. A key part of this effort was to select books in English that are carefully gauged to English literacy levels found among Ugandan students, to stretch young readers just the right amounts in the right directions.
By August 2009 the library was open and ready to lend from its collection of over 3200 books in English and the local language, Rutooro. 
Many children sought to borrow books even before the opening. Interest and activity are high. Musinguzi Moses, a senior teacher at Kasiisi School, is the library reading teacher.
Our plan for libraries is to expand to the four other primary schools associated with Kasiisi Project. Each must have a secure "media room" for books and computers. Between now and the time that facilities have been built and outfitted with books, we might proceed with a traveling "library in a box" to fill some of the need.
Please contact us beforehand if you have books or related materials you might like to donate or buy for the project.
We seek relevant and useful books for our primary school libraries. It is very expensive to ship books from overseas to Uganda - $1 to $2 per book - and to handle them properly there, e.g. to keep them dry in rainy seasons. Where possible we would rather buy books in Uganda, both to save money and to help the local economy. The most relevant and useful book types are:
In early 2009 we conducted an in-depth survey in the five primary schools associated with the Kasiisi Project: Kanyawara, Kasiisi, Kigarama, Kiko and Rweteera. We asked the Ugandans what they see as the most important avenues of effort in their schools.
The response to the survey was clear: improve literacy. Specifically, improve it through fostering a "reading culture", in which children read widely as a habit, beyond just their classroom drills, both for information and for recreation. It is well known that literacy is fundamental to modern economic and social progress, and that having a literate mother correlates with future success.
Starting in 2009 we are advancing on two fronts toward a reading culture: creating lending libraries in primary schools accessible to all students, and providing laptops to as many students as feasible for access to Wikipedia and similar online resources.
Books are scarce in rural western Uganda. Very few homes have any. Even fewer homes have electricity, much less computers. Our goal is to put relevant and useful books in the hands of children and families, planting seeds and striking sparks wherever we can, en route to a reading culture that eventually includes online access for all.