The Students of Escuela Pompilio Romero

My name is Asher Perry and I’m a 7th grade student at John Long Middle School in Wesley Chapel, FL.

This year I will be celebrating my Bar Mitzvah. In the Jewish religion a Bar Mitzvah is a religious ritual and family celebration to commemorate the beginning of Jewish adulthood. An important part of preparing for a Bar Mitzvah is completing a Mitzvah project. A Mitzvah project is a service project that will give me the opportunity to live the Jewish values of repairing the world and showing compassion for others. For my project I am collecting Spanish language books to help start a school library for the Pompilio Romero School in Camelote, near El Progresso in Honduras.

Recently my grandma told me how children in this part of Honduras have no school or public libraries and few, if any, books at home. Reading is important to me, and these kids don’t have books to read for pleasure, so I want to help. I particularly want to help the children of Honduras because my family has been connected to this community for a long time. When my dad went to college, my grandfather, Dr. Douglas Perry, sold his medical practice in Sarasota and moved to Honduras with my grandma to start an eye clinic and provide low cost or free medical care to the people there. Although my grandfather died before I was born, my grandma is still very connected to the community of El Progresso and goes back several times a year to volunteer and support the clinic and the people. Now I want to help too!

You can help by donating new or gently used Spanish language books appropriate for elementary school children (K-6). There are 150-200 children in the school and we hope to collect enough books for everyone to read.

Monetary donations are also accepted – we will use the money to help with shipping costs and to buy additional books for the school. We will be accepting donations until August 31st. This will give us enough time to package and ship the books to arrive in Honduras by late September for this school year.