First charity library was established in Zhonghe Junior High School
Borrowed books were unnecessary to be returned! After New Taipei City Government’s bookcrossing movement, the government united schools and communities to build charity libraries, and the first one was established in Zhonghe Junior High School on 1/2/2014. Mayor Eric Chu attended the library’s opening ceremony and donated thirty books. He was worried that children nowadays only focused on using their smartphones and playing computers, so he encouraged them to read more books.
Chu indicated that reading was very essential for next generation’s education since reading could stimulate humans’ brains to enhance judgment and intelligence, which was the base of education. Cooperating with many media, New Taipei City Government was devoted for promoting reading education for many years. Now the government was trying to unite schools and communities to build charity libraries, and it was hoped that everyone could start to have reading habit.
Mayor Chu represented that the reading movement promoted by New Taipei City was divided into two areas: one was the bookcrossing movement cooperatively run by Cultural Affairs Department and Charity organizations; civilians could directly borrow books at MRT stations, train stations and libraries. The other was charity library establishments; schools’ libraries were adjusted to be opened to the public, and civilians could borrow books at schools. The purpose was to transform schools’ libraries into an interaction platform for civilians to borrow books, return books and donate books.
Eric Chu also encouraged Village Chiefs to communicate with schools, so charity libraries could spread out, and civilians could come to schools to borrow books, read books, return books and even donate books. Chu said that books in charity libraries could be read at home, or at a school, and they were even unnecessary to be returned. Similarly, if people had good books at home, and would like to share them with the public, they could bring those books to charity libraries for sharing.
At Mayor Chu’s speech, he specifically thanked the president of Zhonghe Junior High School Ding Zemin for Mr. Ding’s lead on establishing the first community’s charity library. Mayor said that the idea of charity libraries originated from the concept of open school. In the past schools were only open for citizens to take exercise and hold activities. He hoped that starting from Zhonghe Junior High School, communities’ charity libraries could soon be promoted to every corner of New Taipei City.
The Education Department indicated that Zhonghe Junior High School’s charity library had run for one year, and it always had 600 books on the book shelves at the library. Teachers, students and civilians were freely to borrow and read books. There was no check-out processing, nor limited lending period. Everything was voluntary since the purpose was to encourage people to read, borrow and donate books at Zhonghe Junior High School. Today the charity library was extended, and the collection of books was increased to 3000 books. There were assigned staff to organize and load books. Civilians who came to the school were welcomed to borrow, read and donate books, and hopefully reading behavior could be promoted among surrounding communities of the school.
The president Ding Zemin said that the school specifically purchased second hand books belonging to the categories having fewer collections to load books, so people with different ages could have books they like for borrowing and reading. He really appreciated the donations from enterprises and the good deeds of book donors.