2024 was an impactful yet challenging year for ECBC. We gave away more than 6600 new books to CHOC Children’s Hospital patients across our various inpatient and outpatient book gifting programs, averaging approximately 550 books per month. And our incredible group of bedside reader volunteers delivered 500+ private read-aloud sessions at patients’ bedside — these interactive sessions target literacy skills, complex thinking, and are often kids’ only non-medical related conversations of the day. Despite strong programs and terrific hospital volunteers, fundraising took a significant hit when we were forced to cancel our in-person charity run due to significantly increased upfront costs of hosting the event. With 2023’s cushion, we raised enough to sustain our programs through the year; though our net revenue was negative, a trend our tiny nonprofit cannot afford to continue as we head into 2025. THANK YOU to everyone who supported ECBC in 2024 — every monetary donation; book donation; book drive by schools and other external groups;  and social media shout-out has mattered and allowed ECBC to keep on going.

Going forward in 2025, ECBC is moving into its 10th year of book and reading programs at CHOC. This year, ECBC has the following four priorities:

1. TO SUSTAIN our high levels of book donations across our various book gifting programs — including our gifting libraries at CHOC’s Oncology Clinic and Outpatient Infusion Center so that every child visiting the clinic or OPI can select a high-quality book to keep; our book gifting to patients in isolation via our mobile library cart; our Read Think Thrive (RTT) Bags for patients as they are diagnosed with cancer (valued at $150/bag); and our holiday book gifting such as BOO-ks for Treats on Halloween and our December holiday book gifting. We hope to someday be able to expand beyond CHOC to provide our RTT Bags to kids at other hospitals who are diagnosed with cancer — though this is a more distant goal given the significant additional funds and storage space that would be required for more inventory. Sustaining means continued monetary and book support to continue to meet our hefty book gifting numbers of approximately 500-600 books ($5500) per month.
2. TO GROW our inpatient reading program to more expert reader volunteers, more days per week, more patient floors, and greater impact on kids’ thrivership during their hospital stays. We hope to move closer to our ultimate goal of offering reading to patients daily, consistent with decades of research that shows the benefits of reading aloud at least fifteen minutes per day. This goal is especially important for patients with long-term hospital stays who are often out of school and missing literature-based activities and instruction. We also plan to expand our impact by providing parents with resources to help them optimally support their kids’ cognitive health through treatment with books and reading. The hope is that this can include online methods as well as eventual in-person group sessions with parents during hospital stays.
3. TO OBTAIN office/storage space! We have spent the past 9+ years with a small offsite storage unit and using our founders’ house as the main source of our storage, as well the warehouse space of a friend (the hospital has very little storage space). We are in great need of a single space for book storage, book delivery and processing, and our volunteer activities (like filling the canvas bags for new diagnoses or sorting/stamping the hundreds of books that we gift each month). This is a huge and organizational-changing goal for ECBC that requires an additional $2500 per month to make happen. 
4. TO RE-IMAGINE fundraising strategies so that we can continue the work of ECBC and afford to make the leap to securing office space. As a start, we are looking for champions of ECBC’s mission who are willing to commit to a recurring monthly donation and become an ECBC G.E.M. (Give Every Month). Our goal is to recruit 100 G.E.M.s who donate on average $75 per month — which would allow us to cover ECBC’s usual operational costs as well as $2K per month for office/storage space. We are also looking to recruit a new member to our Board of Directors who has fundraising expertise and can help strategize alternative fundraising methods.

Are you willing to become an ECBC G.E.M. and help us meet our goal? To commit to a recurring donation, please CLICK BELOW. Select your desired level of support or enter your own amount, and check the “Make this a monthly donation” box. 

Thank you for helping ECBC help Orange County’s hospitalized kids to thrive with high-quality books and reading experiences! ECBC is a public-benefit non-profit corporation, EIN 83-2934289.