Books Breaking the Cycle of Slavery

Step into the Rosenfield Lobby on Dec. 6, and you’ll find a special kind of book sale.

During her fellowship with 2011 Grinnell Prize winner James Kofi Annan’s organization, Challenging Heights, Tilly Woodward, curator of academic and public outreach, found a wonderful way to empower child slavery survivors — teaching them to create books.

“I wanted kids to have a special place of their very own to write and draw,” says Woodward. "The director, Madam Linda, wanted a second book that could be sold to donors, giving children money for their schooling when they left the shelter.” Before she left Ghana, Woodward trained the shelter director and house mothers how to marble paper and make books.

When Linda Ludwig, technology services desk team lead, came back from her fellowship at Challenging Heights this summer, Woodward was thrilled to learn the tradition continues.

“[Ludwig] brought me over 90 books made by children at the shelter,” Woodward says. “These are children who are new at the shelter since my time in Ghana, so it was really gratifying to see bookmaking continue.”

The books — handsewn blank journals — will be on sale from 10:30 a.m. to 6:30 p.m. Friday, Dec. 6, in the Rosenfield Lobby.  The minimum price is $5 per book; higher payments accepted. The money goes towards the book-creator's education. “There is no free education in Ghana, and education is one of the key factors in ending the cycle of child slavery,” says Woodward.