In 1981, Nancy Harrington was living at Subic Naval Base in the Philippines with her husband and working as a teacher at a nearby school. She was sad to learn, though, that many of the schools in villages around the Philippines lacked even the most basic books to help children learn.

Nancy Harrington featured in the middle

Nancy decided to do something about it. She knew that people in America had much more than they needed, and she hoped they might be willing to help children in the Philippines who didn't have books and school supplies.

Nancy quickly went to work. She contacted friends and colleagues in America, made an agreement with the flagship airline of the Philippines, and got the U.S. Navy to help. Over the next six years, she helped deliver over 200 tons of educational materials from the United States to poor, rural schools in the Philippines.

In 1987, Nancy and her husband returned to the United States. It might have been easy to return to a normal U.S. life as well, but Nancy decided that the project she had started in the Philippines was just too important to stop. She formed an organization called Books for the Barrios that would carry on her work.

Books for the Barrios works with tens of thousands of schoolchildren in the United States to collect and donate books and school supplies for schools in the Philippines. The organization also works with schoolteachers in the Philippines to give them training in how to use the books and materials that are donated.

Since 1987, Nancy has traveled all around the United States collected books and school supplies. In her travels, she meets many people who want to help, so many people, in fact that she collects more than ONE TON of books and classroom materials EACH DAY!

Nancy makes sure that all these materials are delivered to the Books for the Barrios' National Children's Education Sharing Center in Concord, California. There, the materials are loaded into cargo containers and shipped across the ocean to the Philippines.

Nancy has enjoyed the opportunity to work with people, businesses, and government organizations in the United States and the Philippines. And this month, she's delighted to add a new partner to her work: the Boomerang Box! The Boomerang Box will be carrying a load of books for Books for the Barrios. When it leaves, it will help Nancy continue the good work she has been doing for more than 20 years.