Children'S Book Project

“Board of directors will review return before filing.”

“All top management officers are unpaid”

“The organization's returns can be found on candid and other similar websites.”

“No other documents available to the public.”

“Organization mission or significant activities: the mission of the san francisco-based children's book project (the "project") is to promote literacy by providing (1) free books to children who need them for equity in literacy, learning, and life, and (2) free literacy training, resources, and programs to the educators and organizations serving under-resourced families in the greater bay area and beyond. Our work is based on the knowledge that children who grow up with books have better academic outcomes than their peers who don't, and that reading aloud to children from birth benefits critical brain development. Many children have few or no books of their own and attend schools and programs in which quality books are in short supply; encouraging reading is not enough when families do not have equal access to books. To address the inequity of access, the project supplies (1) books (free, unlimited, and for keeps, for ages 0-18), (2) service partner training for professionals who mentor parents to read aloud to their children (ages 0-5), and (3) other literacy resources and programs, all at no cost.”

“Organization mission: the mission of the san francisco-based children's book project (the "project") is to promote literacy by providing (1) free books to children who need them for equity in literacy, learning, and life, and (2) free literacy training, resources, and programs to the educators and organizations serving under-resourced families in the greater bay area and beyond. The project works in close partnership with educators, public health clinics, and community-based service agencies to ensure free high-quality books, training, resources, and programs reach children who have the greatest need.”

“Program service accomplishments: since our founding in 1992, we have distributed over 3.4 million books, with most going to title 1 schools or to children from low-income neighborhoods in non-school settings, such as public health clinics, after-school organizations (boys and girls clubs, etc.), shelters, community organizations who assist with workforce development, housing needs, foster care, support for children of incarcerated parents, daycares, etc. In 2025, the children's book project received and processed 151,134 books donated by businesses, publishers, authors, individuals (from curated wish lists at bookshop.org (https://bookshop.org/shop/childrensbookproject) and amazon.com (https://https/www.amazon.com/hz/wishlist/ls/317fjvmn43m7q?), and our mainstay - book drives (52 drives in 2025) (https://www.childrensbookproject.org/organize-book-drive-subpage/)), and distributed approximately 12,000 free books every month to children and their families living in low-income neighborhoods, as well as to public schools, shelters and programs for unhoused children, public health clinics, child care and community organizations (including those with workforce development programs) in the greater bay area and beyond. While we primarily serve the greater bay area, in 2025 we served 36 counties in california. Because there is no other organization that offers free, high-quality, unlimited books and literacy resources, some educators and organization staff drive 4-6 hour round trips from counties far from our san francisco bayview district book bank to select our free, quality, unlimited books for their children. With books placed with children individually and in group settings, the project serves over 265,000 children annually. Book bank program (ages 0-18): our book bank in san francisco's bayview district offers hundreds of thousands of books, all free, unlimited, and for keeps. Educators, any organization serving under-resourced children, and storytime program children (on field trips to the book bank) select books from the hundreds of thousands of books at our book bank. The book bank is designed like an independent bookstore, but every book is free. Our books are for children ages 0-18, and for educators (we offer teaching resource materials). We offer books by diverse authors and feature inclusive characters so children have both a mirror that reaffirms their own experience and a window to others' perspectives. We provide books in over 19 languages, and reading tips in english, spanish, and mandarin. We endeavor to offer specialized sections, such as books with protagonists who are deaf or hard of hearing. In 2025, we processed 151,134 donated books to our book bank and the children's book project donated approximately 12,000 books monthly to children and supported 144 community outreach and literacy events. Read aloud program (ages 0-5): our read aloud program trains community partners via expert-led bimonthly workshops for professionals who work with groups of parents with children ages 0-5, with a focus on early literacy development. We provide a written training curriculum for these professionals, expert guest lecturers, and thousands of free new books for children ages 0-5 in a variety of diverse and difficult-to-source languages, including amharic, arabic, chinese, korean, vietnamese, spanish, tagalog, and russian, with a broad range of cultural and racial character representation. In 2025, the read aloud program held 6 workshops, read aloud participants served thousands of parents and children (ages 0-5), and the children's book project donated thousands of free books for these parents. The workshops and books provided are all free. Teen ambassador program our teen ambassador program provides workforce development and community service opportunities for high school students ages 16 and older who love books and reading, empowering them to spread that joy among their school community and become active participants in our m”