This book belongs to
a Detroit kid.
A book a month, Pre-K to 3rd grade
A reading buddy after school
1,200 kids at 14 Detroit schools
$25 a month puts 8 books in Detroit homes, every month.
Why third grade
In 2026, 14.1% of Detroit district third graders scored proficient in reading on the state test (Chalkbeat Detroit, September 2026). Third grade is when kids stop learning to read and start reading to learn.
- 1,200 kids
- Pre-K to 3rd grade, this school year
- 14 schools
- From Brightmoor to Jefferson Chalmers
- $3.12
- What one book costs us, delivered
- 87¢
- Of each dollar spent on programs (sample)
Watch your gift fill a shelf
Monthly is already picked, because monthly gifts are how we order a whole school year of books in August. Move the slider and see where it goes.
Choose an amount
8 books go home every month.
That's a new book every month for 8 Detroit kids: 96 books this year.
Each book costs us $3.12 delivered: $2.64 for the book at nonprofit wholesale, $0.31 for the bookplate and bag, $0.17 to get it to school. 2025 figures, sample.
Card details go to our payment processor's secure page, never this site. Change or cancel a monthly gift anytime from the link in every receipt.
Your year of books: 96
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One gift, one stamp. Monthly fills the whole card.
Fall Book Drive 42 days left
7,940 of 12,000 books, yours adds 8. Sample figures.
Open Shelf Literacy Project is a 501(c)(3) public charity, EIN 38-0000000 (placeholder). No goods or services are provided for this gift, so all of it is tax-deductible as allowed by law.
October's books. One title per grade, picked by our schools' reading teachers.
Real books we would buy this month. Every family keeps every one.
- Pre-K· · · · · · · · · ·Hair LoveMatthew A. CherryZuri's dad learns her hair. Read it twice: once for the words, once for the pictures.
- Kindergarten· · · · · · · · · ·The Snowy DayEzra Jack KeatsPeter's first snow. Short sentences a new reader can point to.
- Grade 1· · · · · · · · · ·We Are in a Book!Mo WillemsElephant and Piggie find out someone is reading them. Built for reading aloud in two voices.
- Grade 2· · · · · · · · · ·Mercy Watson to the RescueKate DiCamilloA pig, a bed, a hole in the floor. Short chapters, big type, first chapter book.
- Grade 3· · · · · · · · · ·Ways to Make SunshineRenée WatsonRyan Hart and her family start over in a smaller house. A chapter book about a girl who stays hopeful.
- Grade 3, Spanish· · · · · · · · · ·Juana & LucasJuana MedinaJuana and her dog in Bogotá, with Spanish words on every page.
$25 a month, worked out.
A book's month
Teachers pick it
Every August, reading teachers at our 14 schools choose one title per grade per month, matched to what their class is working on.
We buy it for $2.64
We order the whole year at once at nonprofit wholesale prices. Monthly gifts are what let us place that order in August.
It gets a bookplate
Volunteers paste a plate inside the cover with the child's first name. The book is theirs to keep, not to return.
It goes home
On the first Monday of the month, each book goes home in a backpack with a note for the family in English, Spanish, Arabic or Bengali.
A buddy reads it
Twice a week after school, a trained volunteer reads the same book with the child, then the child reads it back.
It stays on a shelf
By June a child in the program owns ten books of their own. Many homes we serve started with none.
HELP
Our 14 schools
Ambrose Elementary · Linwood Park Academy · Clara Day School · Vernor Street Bilingual School · Riverbend Elementary · Warren Oak School · Lakeshore Rise Elementary · Grand River Commons · Conant Gardens Primary · Oakland Avenue School · Trumbull Primary · Chadsey Park Elementary · Six Mile Green School · Gratiot Woods Elementary
School names are samples for this concept build. See every school, its grades and its buddy days.
One-time gifts buy books this month. Monthly gifts let us place the whole year's order in August, at the lowest price, before school starts.