David Eugene Byer

Speaking Time and Room No.: 2006-9-22 16:00-18:00 Room II

Speaker: David E Byer (USA)

30th IBBY World Congress, Macau, September 2006

Free Seminar Theme: Reading of the Underprivileged Children

TITLE: ILLUSTRATED CHILDREN’S BOOKS FOR VISION COMMUNITY CENTER LIBRARY, MACHA HOSPITAL, CHOMA, ZAMBIA

Presenter: David E Byer Rochester Minnesota USA

Thank you so very much for this opportunity to discuss my project: Illustrated Children’s Books for Vision Community Center Library at Macha Hospital, Choma, Zambia. I profess no expertise in children’s literature. I am a physician. My medical specialty is anesthesiology. However, I have an interest in children, especially the children of Africa. I came to IBBY 2006 to learn more about children’s literature. I eagerly solicit your advice and suggestions of how to better develop the library.

PRESENTATION GOALS

I’ll describe the setting of Macha Hospital and Vision Community Center Macha. Next we’ll learn about Vision Community Center. We’ll discuss our methods of selection of titles for the library. Finally, we’ll consider future directions the library may take.

MACHA COMMUNITY

Macha is a rural community located in the Southern Province of Zambia. It is 70 kilometers via gravel road from the nearest town of Choma. It is 380 kilometers from Lusaka, the capital. In Macha, 611 households were counted during Census 2000 with a total population of 5,157. The people of the area live in small homesteads. The primary livelihood is subsistence farming. Most farmers own cattle. Several schools provide for education from pre-school to grade 12. Sixty per cent of the people are educated to grade 12. Industrial development is non-existent. Young people tend to move to urban areas.

MACHA HOSPITAL AND THE MALARIA RESEARCH INSTITUTE AT MACHA

Established in 1955, the 208-bed hospital provides services for an estimated population of 70,000 to 100,000. The hospital has experienced remarkable development since 2002. It became a field research site for the Johns Hopkins School of Public Health Malaria Research Institute. A six-hectare campus for the Malaria Institute at Macha (MIAM) is currently under construction. The dream of Dr. Phil Thuma, medical director of MIAM, is to establish and maintain a world-class laboratory and research community in this rural location.

VISION COMMUNITY CENTER MACHA

In Zambia, as in many African countries, people continue to move from rural areas to urban areas where already half of the population of Zambia lives. The goal of Vision Community Center Macha is to diminish the movement of people from this rural area to the underprivileged urban areas. The plan is to instill hope, trust and pride in this rural community by providing jobs, housing and a variety of activities. Fred Mweetwa first nurtured Vision Community Center Macha. Fred is a young person reared and educated in the Macha Community. He identified communications, training, Internet, and sports as priorities.

The community center houses a variety of interdependent units. These include an Internet café with satellite link, computer workshop, sports department, restaurant, community hall, community garden, radio station, craft shop, HIV/AIDS counseling center, and library. In order to improve housing opportunities, a 30-person hostel, THE ARK, was built. An airstrip, ABFA-MACHA Aerodrome, currently accommodates 100 flights per year. The local community as well as scientists coming to the malaria research center use it. Thus, the library is one element of this project.

THE LIBRARY AT VISION COMMUNITY CENTER MACHA

Established in late 2004, the library clearly is in its early stages of development. At present it is more accurately described as a bookshelf operation. It shares a room with the craft shop. However, this library is the only source of books at Macha. There is active community interest in the library. Patrons have a marked preference for African titles and religious books. Several schools in the community, including the Macha Innovative Community School, have adopted the library as a natural extension of the classroom. The initial books for the library came from the personal libraries of two Dutch families.

THE DAVID AND JEAN BYER FAMILY AND THE LIBRARY AT VISION COMMUNITY CENTER MACHA

My wife Jean and I visited Macha Hospital in January 2005. We brought a copy of Sense Pass King: A Story of Cameroon authored by Katrin Tchana, illustrated by her late mother, Trina Schart Hyman. We wondered what sort of response the book would elicit from Zambian children. Would they be frightened by some of the illustrations? We showed the book to the children in Bulebo village near Macha. Their delight and fascination was obvious. Jean and I decided to develop a select collection of illustrated children’s books to supplement the library holdings.

ASSEMBLING A COLLECTION

We began by focusing on African folklore. Naïve, but eager to learn, we prepared booklists from online searches of a variety of databases. These included the Rochester Public Library of Rochester Minnesota, Barnes and Noble Books, Amazon Books, Africa Access Children’s Africana Book Awards, and South African Children’s Literature. We also searched in bookshops of Lusaka and Johannesburg. We faced limited shelf space, limited funds, and limited shipping capacity. So, we assigned priority to titles by award-winning authors and illustrators. All books were read to determine suitability for the Zambian cultural context. We avoided certain titles. Fortunately, almost all books evaluated are available for review at our local Rochester Public Library.

SOURCES OF BOOKS

Our first books were used titles purchased from Internet vendors. In most instances the final cost including shipping of books from these sources amounted to 50% of the publisher’s price. One advantage of purchase via the Internet is that most books are ex-library, with library bindings and dust jacket protectors. A less expensive source is public library book sales. Friends of Rochester Public Library offer numerous used illustrated children’s books at five to ten percent of original price. Sometimes they provided titles without charge. Some of our friends donated selected titles. Inexpensive used books are also available at a number of thrift shops in Rochester. A member of the 2006 Caldecott Award selection committee sent several of the titles she reviewed for the committee.

TRANSPORTATION OF BOOKS TO MACHA

Our family visits Macha Hospital at least once a year. We use our checked luggage allowance for transportation of medical supplies and books. Occasionally airlines have waived, for humanitarian purposes, excess luggage charges.

THE FUTURE

Youth and adults of Macha have requested titles and subjects of interest to them. We broadened our selection of books to include biography, sports, science and religious topics. We are always looking for books by Africans. We look forward to the time when the library may have dedicated space for its patrons. Planned expansion of the Macha Innovative Community School requires a larger library. I’m sure that at some point we will need to transport more books than is possible using our airline luggage allowance.

CONCLUSION

Thank you very much for this opportunity to describe the Vision Community Center library. I welcome your advice and suggestions.