"Books for Buddies" Delivers Hundreds of Books to First Graders

"Books for Buddies," a book donation drive started by local-area high school Junior Tage Smith, has gained notice and support from the Birmingham community. Tage started the service project this summer as a way to give back to the community. He selected the first grade classroom at Bennett Elementary School in Southwest Detroit. Tage advertised his efforts on social media and started collecting gently-used and new books in the local area, receiving overwhelming support from the Birmingham community! During the first week of school, Tage was able to deliver over 100 books to the classroom, and has collected many more to be delivered this month!

"Books for Buddies" is committed to collecting books for the entire school year. Donated books are collected, sorted by theme/author/subject and delivered to the classroom by Tage each month. "The focus of my organization is to give our less fortunate youths in the Detroit metropolitan area books to read free of charge. We have adopted a first grade classroom at Bennett Elementary, and our goal is to provide each student with a book a month for the entire school year. This means we are raising funds for and collecting 300 books," said Tage.

If you are interested in finding out more or donating books to this cause, please visit the "Books for Buddies" Facebook page. "We can provide a suggested reading list, but please feel free to suggest your own," he said.