Ellington Infant School in Ramsgate has received a delivery of over 120 new books thanks to a generous donation from Margate Rotary Club.
The Rotary Club had worked hard to secure some funding from Kent County Council to support children in the area, and made a donation of £1000 to Ellington to purchase new books. To support the endeavour, ‘The Bookshop’, in Westgate, carefully curated a selection of books to fit the budget and the school’s brief. As a real bonus for the school, The Bookshop was able to use its access to discounts, which meant the school received more than £1250 worth of new, high-quality books.
Ellington headteacher Adnan Ahmet was thrilled to learn of the Rotary Club’s offer, saying: “When I received the phone call asking if we were interested in receiving a donation for books, I couldn’t believe my ears. It is not often that schools are offered something for free.
“We are incredibly grateful to the Rotary Club for thinking of us, particularly for this cause. Books play such an enormous part in the development of children, and being able to use such a generous amount of money to further improve our selection of high-quality books will have such a positive impact on our children.
“Our wonderful librarians had recently written a wish-list for our library, which we were hoping to be able to purchase gradually over time, school budget allowing. Thanks to this donation, we have fulfilled that wish-list by ensuring we have a comprehensive selection of books written by the authors that our classes in school are named after, and also books that explore the diversity of the society that we are living in, so that more children can see their own contexts reflected in books.
“All of us at Ellington would like to extend the most sincere thank you to the Rotary Club of Margate, and to Helen and Adam at The Bookshop for making this possible.”