SCARCE, 800 S. Rohlwing Road (Route 53), Ad-dison, started a project called Literacy at the Laun-dromat, bringing books to children who might not otherwise have much access to them. Pictured at the Addison facility is SCARCE founder and execu-tive director Kay McKeen, with just some of the brand new books that will be distributed to 10 par-ticipating laundromats in DuPage County. There is also a participating laundromat in Arlington Heights.
According to the “Handbook of Early Literacy Research, Vol. 2,” the ratio of books to children in a middle-income home is 13 to 1. That ratio becomes one book for every 300 children in low-income homes.
Addison-based SCARCE (School and Community Assistance for Recycling and Compost Education) has taken its mission to reduce, reuse and recycle in a unique direction that not only keeps perfectly good books from ending up in landfills, but also helps provide literacy opportunities for those children whose access to books may be limited.
As Kay McKeen, founder and executive director of SCARCE (formerly SCRAP), tells it, it was quite by accident that the idea to put children’s books in laundromats came about—a project that would become known as Literacy at the Laundromat.
She narrated that around eight to 10 years ago, she heard from a teacher/volunteer, who was working on his Ph.D., about another Ph.D. student who had come up with an idea to place children’s books in laundromats.
While that Ph.D. student’s identity remains unknown, what McKeen does know is that he or she was clever in trying to think of a way “to get books to kids who need them.”
“We don’t know if they ever did it,” she continued. “[But] as we thought about it … it is a great place to spend time reading.”
So, McKeen started contacting some school districts, and one in particular, Addison District 4, agreed to work with SCARCE to contribute some books, and now Addison has three laundromats participating in the project.
The director said the district helps provide books in English, Spanish and Polish.
West Chicago has three laundromats participating, Warrenville has one, Villa Park has one (at 414 N. Ardmore Ave.), Bensenville has one and now Lombard has one at 409 Crescent Blvd.
Outside of DuPage County, there is also one bookshelf set up at a laundromat in Arlington Heights.
Thanks to a college intern, the laundromats have refurbished, painted two-shelf bookshelves, McKeen related, which are sturdy and can hold about 200 books.
She said SCARCE supplies new books to the little libraries (Addison District 4 also supplies some for the Addison laundromats), and she estimates the SCARCE facility on Route 53 has “thousands” of books.
Stacks of brand new books—unsold from such places as retail stores (and then returned to the parent company) that are kept out of landfills—sit in boxes just waiting for volunteers to bring them to the laundromats. Some are also taken to area food pantries as well.
The director said volunteers check the laundromats on a regular basis, to make sure the shelves are adequately filled. Tammy Ireland, a teacher in Lombard, checks on the Crescent Avenue location.
McKeen thought of “a good example” of how the books are being utilized, saying that while SCARCE only sends out new books, a volunteer noticed at one laundromat that the books “looked beat up.”
The director surmised that children were taking the books home, reading them and possibly sharing them, then returning them to take a new book. “They’ve got their own library going,” she quipped.
McKeen said some children might be living in a vehicle, so a book may be returned after it is read, since there would be little room to store books.
She also remembers one mom’s particular feedback: The woman said she is now able to build a home library, and “This would never be possible without this project.”
The director said she is hoping to expand Literacy at the Laundromat, and was scheduled to speak this week to members of the School District 45 Green Team, teachers and administrators to explain how the project works.
As part of another literacy-related project—and thanks to a facility that spans 18,900 square feet—SCARCE is now collecting books, pencils, erasers and pencil sharpeners to send to Liberia in mid-December, because “They have no public schools,” according to McKeen.
She said children have to break one pencil into three pieces so each child has something to write with.
And if that is not a big enough project, the director said SCARCE sends supplies to 105 countries.
The director said she is in need of a volunteer to monitor the laundromat in Villa Park and one to monitor the Bensenville location, at 30 E. Green St.
For more information about Literacy at the Laundromat, making a donation to SCARCE or how to become a volunteer, visit scarce.org or call 630-545-9710.
