By RASHAD ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

rrolle@tribunemedia.net

MORE than 20,000 books have been donated to the Urban Renewal Commission by schools in Broward County, Ft Lauderdale.

The Florida schools no longer require textbooks as they move to “computerise their system”, Urban Renewal 2.0 co-chair Cynthia “Mother” Pratt explained.
She added that the books cover a variety of topics, including mathematics, English, history, auto mechanics, engineering and journalism.

The books are intended to help students from Kindergarden to grade 12.

Mrs Pratt said: “These books are very expensive, from math to science to English to history, everything is here. We are so grateful that we didn’t have to pay for this.

“This is millions of dollars that have been donated to the Bahamian people. We are grateful. We will now donate the books to education, to the community, to churches, to centres.”

The vice-president of fiscal affairs and administration at Atlanta College, Melanie Thompson, was on hand for the donation presentation.

She said: “The books will go a long way to helping the 35 students enrolled in our GED (general educational development) programme.

“These are very necessary because as a GED programme we have to take some of our students a little bit back from grade 12, so some students we had to take them back from grade 6, grade 7, so the material that’s here is wonderful, and is so needed and timely.”
Mrs Pratt said the books can be collected for free from Mable Walker Primary School, Monday through Friday.