he purpose of our annual banquet is to raise the funds to construct 50 more bookcases for children in low-income families in our community. We plan to hold these banquets each year for decades to come. However, this is only part of the story. Most any civic club, church or other group can build bookcases and give them to small children in low-income families. Our project is vastly different because we have a “community-wide" approach as we seek to involve everyone in the in the project, in one way or another. We want all our citizens to become “aware” of the problem of illiteracy, and the costs to all of us in society, and what we can do to focus on literacy, especially parents reading to their children in the home.

he more than 300 people who attend enable us to raise more than $4500, more than enough to purchase the wood and supplies to build the next 50 bookcases and some extra to provide $500 as start-up costs for other communities in our state and nation. Everyone present enjoys a great meal, some fantastic entertainment and receives a complimentary copy of the founder’s book “Learning, Earning & Giving Back.” The key phrase is “Giving Back.” It is a time to remember as we have launched a project that will impact literacy for decades to come.

o have a successful “Bookcase Literacy Banquet” -- and any community has the resources to do this -- there are countless details that must be handled in a timely and orderly way. From this point forward, we will take each area and break it down into manageable parts and make them so simple and clear that it will be a joy to see your own banquet come together. The key to success is to begin early, three months or more, especially for your first banquet. Each succeeding banquet will become easier and take less time.

owever, before we get to the different areas and the details, please click on both of the slide show links and see a few of the many photos that were taken before and during both of our banquets. As we move forward, you will see the various parts of the process and the planning come together. We will see you on the other side of the slide show.

ope you enjoyed seeing those pictures. We were having fun when they were taken. More importantly, we feel good about the purpose of our "Bookcase for Every Child" project and our reason for being there. To have a successful banquet and bookcase project, here is a basic concept that is important to understand. Unlike most community service projects, we don’t need much money. It does not cost much money to buy the wood, supplies, printing, and other items to hold the two functions that we hold, The Bookcase Literacy Banquet and the Annual Awards Ceremony.

hat we need is great numbers of people to get involved and serve on various committees and help carry out the project. It is far better to have 300 people pay $15.95 each to attend our banquet, than to have three or four people give $1,000 each. Hopefully, you will see that large donations are counterproductive. Small donations are fine but not large donations, because this gives a false sense of security and many of our citizens will feel like you don’t need their help. This is why government handouts kill incentive. You will see a real opportunity for others to get involved when we discuss The Bookcase Club in the following segment.

The Bookcase Club

he purpose of The Bookcase Club is to raise money to pay for the food for your banquet. There are many successful business and professional people in every community who will gladly give $50 each year to meet this need and have the feeling they are making a difference. This is also an opportunity for more people to participate, especially those who don’t have the time, or may be physically disabled, but want to help support the project.

everal weeks before the banquet, our chairman sends about 30 letters to prominent people asking them to contribute $50 for this need and become a member of The Bookcase Club. In a short period of time, prior to both banquets, he has received responses from over 20 individuals who contributed more than enough to pay the cost of the food, decorations and table items. He feels confident that these community minded citizens will continue to support our projet in this way, for many years to come. Here is an important consideration. We don’t provide a tax deduction and the amount of $50 is so small that it is not a consideration.

There are countless people in every community who will buy the food for your banquet, when invited to be a part of such a worthy cause	Be sure to thank all those who contribute and become a member of The Bookcase Club. A simple “Thank You” card will be fine	While we are not 501 (C) (3) Corporation, some companies, not individuals, may need a statement to honor your request

Publicity for banquet

ortunately, in today’s times we don’t have to use a “town crier” to get the word out that you are having a “Bookcase Literacy Banquet” and you want to invite everyone to attend. When you consider a good meal, great entertainment, and a complimentary book, all for $15.95, it’s the best deal around. But much more important is your purpose for holding the banquet. It is to enable children in your community to have a personalized bookcase, a starter set of books, and a much brighter future by developing a passion for reading very early in life.

ere it’s important to be creative in spreading the word about your upcoming event. Write articles, and use photographs, and submit them to your newspaper. Over the next few months have several articles with the content timed to provide the inspiration for your local people to get involved. If you have a cable television station, help them develop a good ad giving the date, location, time, costs and purpose of holding the banquet. You should have 2-3 members of your committee who can speak to civic clubs, AARP, churches, and other groups about your project and the purpose of your banquet. Taking all the free publicity you can get, the cost of printing, postage and other incidental expenses, should run no more than $200-$300, if that much. In time, word of mouth will serve you well.

ere in our community, one of our leading pastors wrote a letter about the banquet to pastors in all our larger churches. Don’t forget, most of your committee members will attend a local church and can help to coordinate the event with their pastor or minister and make tickets available to their members. The purpose of the publicity is to build support for your bookcase literacy project and to tell your citizens how much it will benefit these children and what it will mean to your community in the months and years to come. Let all your people know they can help by attending the banquet and purchasing tickets.

e learned from one of our committee members the best way to sell tickets is to sell a “table” of tickets, 8 to 10 people at each table. This way the tables are reserved and they can all sit together. As you build support you will find that almost all of your banks, other local businesses, and public officials will purchase a table of tickets. Remember to make small signs that tell who is sponsoring the table, so it will be reserved for those who have paid for it, as well as be a miniature billboard for that business or elected public official. Remember our concept. We want people to be involved, so do your best to make sure all of your seats are filled.

hen you begin early and all of your bookcase project committee is involved, you will have fun and build enthusiasm for your project and you will sell all your tickets. Since this is an all-volunteer project and you won’t need a lot of money, we suggest a maximum of 400 tickets need to be sold, and even 300 will be sufficient to meet your finanical needs. This is what makes this project so unique. It’s not about raising money but rather our focus is about helping children learn to read, and get a good education.

This article is the type your local newspaper can generate to invite people to attend your Bookcase Literacy Banquet	This article or one similar should run in your local newspaper a few days prior to your banquet	An influential pastor who supports your bookcase project can appeal to other pastor’s to get involved and encourage his or her members to attend your banquet	Members of your committee can speak to various civic clubs leading up to your banquet to encourage them to buy tickets and support your “community-wide” literacy project

Select the Right Location

o the casual observer, it may not seem very important to select the right location to hold a “Bookcase Literacy Banquet,” but it is very important. The reason this is important is because your banquet will be a “community-wide” event and people from all across the community and all walks of life will be attending. Many people will feel uncomfortable, and others will not attend if the banquet is held at a particular church, civic club building, places that serve alcohol, or where gambling takes place. We are all committed to being good role models for these pre-school children.

he best place to hold your banquet is a public school cafeteria because this is a neutral setting and everyone will feel comfortable and your attendance will grow year by year. Please keep in mind, your public schools is where most of your children will be attending. Another reason a public school cafeteria is the right place is because they have kitchen facilities to prepare your meal. You don’t need to be reminded that the way to get a good crowd of people is good food and good entertainment. We had that covered really well and you can too, and we will get into the details in the next section.

The Bob Courtway Middle School Cafeteria in Conway, where we hold our Annual Bookcase Literacy Banquet

The Decoration Committee

t’s exciting when you can create something that is good and will make a difference in people’s lives. On each occasion our banquet room was decorated with a beautiful literacy theme, using books, bookcases, fall colors on the table arrangements and a special 4’ X 12’ hand painting by well-known artist Gary Reeves. Another semi-retired art teacher, Jo Ann Townsend, decorated the room, assisted by Linda Hammontree, a member of our committee who was in charge of this part of the banquet. Linda also purchased the supplies to set the tables, paper plates, hot & cold cups, plastic silverware, napkins, salt, pepper, parmesan cheese, creamer and sweetener. Along with the food, these items were paid for from the money donated by The Bookcase Club.

Semi-Retired art teacher, Garry Reeves, hand-painted this 4 ft X 12 ft, “Logo” of our project to display at various functions.	Semi-Retired art teacher, JoAnn Townsend used her creative ability to decorate our banquet setting with a literacy theme

he table decorations and painting can be viewed on the 2008 banquet slide-show featured earlier in this “Bookcase Literacy Banquet” fundraiser portion of the website.

The Kitchen Committee

ow for some good news that will hit your taste buds. One of the highlights of both of our banquets was the same fantastic meal that was prepared by our team of 8 to 10 volunteer cooks. We patterned our meal, which will be consistent year after year, after an annual spaghetti dinner that has been served by a small Catholic church in Center Ridge, Arkansas for almost 50 years. With only 75 families, the St. Joseph Catholic Church feeds over 2500 people in about six hours time. They serve, in addition to spaghetti, Italian sausage, kraut, slaw, corn, sweet pickle chunks, home made rolls, coffee, tea and home-made desserts.

his menu has proven to be a winner because some of the items it contains will hit most everyone’s taste buds. The people who attended our banquets are still talking about it. The food, at the first banquet, was served by 43 students, and two teacher advisors, in one of our school's “book club” and they did a wonderful and efficient job. Students from one of the other schools served the meal for our second banquet. We have three different school systems in our community and our plan is to rotate students from each of these schools year to year. Some of our schools require that students give so many hours of community service each year, so our banquet provided them with a real opportunity to do this.

he lunch room supervisor for one of our schools helped us figure out how much food to order and placed the order for us. After the banquet we gave them a check for the total of the invoice which made it pretty simple. This money will come from your bookcase club account. The school cafeteria where you hold your banquet will have one or two of their employees to assist your cooks as they are familiar with all the equipment. They are also excellent workers but will have to be paid an hourly rate. Your volunteer cooks will come from various churches, committee members, civic clubs and others who are known to be good cooks and have a heart for helping young people.

ou can also ask other people around the community who are also known to be good cooks to provide a home-made dessert. We had more than enough, and a total of about 20 desserts should be ample to meet this need. Hopefully you see the spirit of how we are getting as many good people involved in the banquet as possible as they too will help to spread the message of literacy and helping these children in low income families. There is another consideration that will require a little time, effort and money and that is the bowls, silverware, spaghetti forks, and other kitchen utensils to serve the meal.

he aspect or feature that makes our banquet meal special is that it is served “family style,” with bowls of food on the table and guests pass it among others at the same table. This helps to create a “Home” atmosphere and that is what we want. However, public school cafeterias are not equipped to serve “family style” and, as already stated, you will need to purchase a complete set of everything you will need. This is a one-time purchase and once you have made it, you will never have to purchase these items again. We went to discount stores and so-called "dollar stores," where every item is one dollar.

ome of the smaller bowls were two for a dollar so the costs were very reasonable. All the items we needed came to less than $500 and this can be taken from the proceeds of your first banquet. Please click on the following link as we have provided a list of the food items, quantity and cost to feed between 300 and 400 people and also a list of the items to serve the meal family style.

Suggested Banquet Agenda	Food items to serve "family style"	List of serving items and utensils

Family Friendly Entertainment

ne of the objectives for our annual banquet is to have family friendly entertainment. The children for whom we are providing bookcases and books, are 3, 4 and 5 years of age and, as already stated, we want to do our best to be good role models for them. While those who attend the banquet will be mostly adults, we want children to always be welcome there, and to have a good time, as we strive to create a wholesome environment for them. For our inaugural banquet, we were blessed to have a fantastic bluegrass band and a special appearance by the 2007 Arkansas State Champion Fiddle Player. At our second banquet, we had the Conway High "Jazz" Band and they played big band music.

fter the band’s performance they received a standing ovation. We plan to have a different type of musical group each year -- country, big band, gospel, men’s or women's chorus, etc. There will be many who will support our project by attending every year. But we hope that by catering to different musical tastes, we will involve many more people. That’s our goal. In time, we want to involve everyone in the fight against illiteracy. There is great local talent in every community and most will gladly perform a benefit, to support your “Bookcase for Every Child” literacy project.

Jason Rapert, special guest Tim Trawick, and band members furnished “standing ovation” entertainment for our 2008 banquet	Members of the St. Joseph High School “Book Club” served our banquet meal. One eight grade student, Brittany Davanzo, is an accomplished violinist

Addendum: Tips of Things We Have Learned to Make Your Banquet Run Smoother and More Efficently.

A “Literacy Reminder” Book

The title of this book “Learning, Earning & Giving Back” embodies the essence of this bookcase project. Every person can “give back” and help to improve literacy in America

very person who attends our banquet receives a complimentary copy of the book titled, “Learning, Earning & Giving Back.” This book, written by bookcase project founder Jim Davidson, is not about the “Bookcase for Every Child” project. Rather, it is a collection of 49 of Mr. Davidson’s weekly newspaper columns, as selected by a panel of award-winning journalists. This book was published for the specific purpose of generating funds to improve literacy in America. Initially, Mr. Davidson had 10,000 copies of this book printed and paid for them personally, as his way of giving back.

iving a complimentary copy of this book to all who attend our banquet is for two basic reasons. First, there are millions of people in America today who do not know how serious the problem of illiteracy really is. Each book contains a little gold seal inside the front cover that tells why the book was published and, over time, will serve to create “awareness” regarding the vast numbers of people in America who are illiterate. As you continue to give this book away, year after year, the number of people who become aware, and are willing to get involved, will increase, and the tide of illiteracy will begin to change.

econdly, giving away this book provides an excellent way for each community to “give back” by helping another community to start a successful bookcase project. The book sells for $15.95, the amount you charge for each banquet ticket. Of this amount $12.00 stays in your local community and the remaining $3.95 is remitted to our Nationwide Literacy Campaign account. This money will then be used to fund other projects across America. The $3.95 amount is assesed for each ticket sold as the book is complimentary and some people may not choose to take one. This commitment is only for the first three years of the project. Beyond this time, money remitted to help other projects get started will be on a voluntary basis.

his simple plan means that your committee will be “Giving Back” to help another community, like yours, to improve literacy. It is indeed more blessed to give than to receive and this is a small price to pay when you consider the fact that since 2005, members of the Conway Bookcase Project Committee have spent hundreds of man hours, and thousands of dollars since beginning the project. We have forged the path and learned by trial and error to perfect the process, so communities across America can have a successful project, and not have to make the costly and time-consuming mistakes we have made.

t should be noted that no person on our committee profits personally in any way. This is why the project is so successful. It’s all about Giving Back. Each community in our nation can help another, then another, until the project spreads to communities all across this great country of ours. Then we will see literacy and graduation rates begin to improve. This is vital to our nation’s future. With this bookcase project plan comes an opportunity for leadership, and to display true honesty and integrity. The children we are helping need to see real character on the part of community leaders. This provides all of us a wonderful opportunity to give back, in so many different ways.

Handling Your Finances

Project volunteers are shown here making reservations for church members to attend our banquet. Have extra literature on hand

ver time, your bookcase project committee will receive funds in three basic ways. This will require two different checking accounts at a local bank. The first account, and the one used most often, will be titled, “(name of your city, town, county) Bookcase Project.” The funds from ticket sales for your “Bookcase Literacy Banquet” will go into this account, along with small donations. The second account will be “The Bookcase Club” and funds donated to pay for the cost of food will go in this account.

hese accounts should be non-interest-bearing accounts as this eliminates any problems with the IRS. Accounts that earn less than $10.00 do not have to be reported. Here we have a branch manager of a local bank to serve as our treasurer. When you set up the accounts, use the Social Security number of a committee member and this person, along with another committee member, and the branch manager are on the signature cards, authorized to write checks. You handle each of the two accounts in the same way. The whole process is very simple. You pay for the wood, supplies, and other expenses to build the bookcases from the Bookcase Project account, and The Bookcase Club to pay for the food and supplies for the banquet. Just make sure there is money in the accounts before anyone writes a check.

s a wrap-up for your banquet, make sure your chairperson or another committee member writes Thank–You notes to all those who made a special contribution. This can be a printed formal Thank You card or one from a stationery story with a “Thank You” printed on the front. People need and want to be appreciated. Just make sure it gets done.

This is a copy of both sides of our banquet ticket. These can be printed 6-up and cut apart to save on printing costs	A form similar to this one can be mailed to prospects, used as a statement stuffer, or in high traffic areas to advertise your banquet	A verbal commitment to purchase tickets for your banquet can be followed up with a statement to give details and request payment	Copies of our check and deposit ticket for our “The Bookcase Club” to pay for food and banquet expenses are offered to assist you in keeping these funds separate to honor your commitments	Copies of our check and deposit ticket for our building account are offered as a guide to assist you in setting up your accounts. Our goal is not to raise money but to help children in low-income families	While forms used by various financial institutions vary greatly, this form was used to open our two separate bank accounts