Verleysen Siblings Join Forces to Promote Literacy Abroad

Anthony Verleysen ’12 and his sister Sabrina Verleysen ’14 have created Project Buku Buku (Book Book), an international book drive to collect English novels for under-resourced Muslim boarding schools in Central Java, Indonesia. Deeply believing in the core values of service, community, and unity, the siblings are committed to helping provide strong educational resources to students around the world.

Sabrina is currently a Fulbright English Teaching Assistant in Demak, Central Java, where she teaches English to more than five hundred tenth and eleventh grade students at Madrasah Aliyah Negeri (MAN) Demak. Sabrina was shocked to discover that even though the grammar course work is rigorous, the library shelves are bare, and novels, comics, magazines, and short stories are nonexistent. The goal of Project Buku Buku is to create an English lending library.

“With this library, students will not only be able to greatly increase their English literacy rates, but will be able to curate a love for reading—a skill that has the possibility to change lives, one book at a time,” said Sabrina. “Project Buku Buku will especially empower Indonesian high school girls because they will have the opportunity to greatly increase their English literacy rates, leading them to pursue future educational opportunities including completing university applications, taking the test of English as a foreign language, and applying for international scholarship and fellowship opportunities.”

If you are interested in donating books or funds to Project Buku Buku, please contact Anthony or Sabrina directly. See suggested book titles  here.

You can follow Sabrina’s journey as a Fulbright English Teaching Assistant on her blog, Tales of Demak.