Just before the end of 2017, Taman Bacaan Pelangi was honored to be involved in a great partnership with Google.org, Room to Read and Inibudi.org.

Google.org launched this partnership on December 17th, 2017 in Jakarta. At the launch event, Shinto Nugroho, the Head of Public Policy and Government Relations of Google Indonesia, delivered an opening speech and explained the highlight of the project. Joel Bacha, Director of Strategic Expansion of Room to Read, also delivered his speech and gave a brief info about the partnership. Our founder, Nila Tanzil, gave an inspiring presentation about Taman Bacaan Pelangi’s work and impact in Eastern Indonesia. And Najeela Shihab, the Founder of Inibudi.org, also gave a presentation about Inibudi.org and the work they do to empower teachers across Indonesia.

The launch event was attended by 100 teachers from Jabodetabek area, Gresik, and Flores. Two teachers and two school principals from four schools where Taman Bacaan Pelangi located also attended the event. We’re so happy to have them there!

With this partnership, Google.org wants to help foster a reading habit and reach 200,000 children across Indonesia. The partnership will be in the form of a free digital library of children’s stories that anyone can contribute and have access to. Together, we will develop teaching materials and carry out teacher trainings in Eastern Indonesia to enhance teaching methods that improve literacy. The project will also help Indonesian authors and illustrators to create more engaging books for children.

In Indonesia today, it’s estimated that for every 100 children who enter school, only 25 exit meeting minimum international standards of literacy and numeracy. This poses a range of challenges for our country, where nearly one-third of the population—or approximately 90 million people—are below the age of 15. And to tackle this, for sure, we can’t work alone.

Thank you, Google.org, for choosing us to be one of your partners in this project. Let’s foster the reading habit in Indonesia!