UAE / Living
Sharjah Book-Fair Donation Drive Targets 10,000 Books With a Clear Route for Families and Schools
The Big Heart Foundation’s appeal, announced on 8 November, accepts suitable new and pre-loved books at Expo Centre Sharjah through 15 November. The useful task for donors is to select books another reader can actually use.
A book-fair visit can include a donation
The Big Heart Foundation has invited visitors to Sharjah International Book Fair to help collect more than 10,000 books for its humanitarian and education programmes. The appeal was reported on Sunday, 8 November, while the fair continues at Expo Centre Sharjah through 15 November. It is organised with the UAE Board on Books for Young People. The target describes what the campaign aims to collect, rather than a total already received or a number of books that have already reached their next readers.
Donations can be taken to the foundation’s stand in Hall 5, L-12. New and pre-loved books in good condition are welcomed across genres, including picture books, novels and biographies, with religious books excluded under the published criteria. For families planning a visit, the immediate action is therefore specific: select suitable books, check their condition and bring them to the identified stand. This is an opportunity to contribute during an existing outing rather than a requirement to purchase a new collection.
Quality matters more than clearing a shelf
MyGCCNews’s analysis is that a book drive works best when the donor thinks about the next reader. The condition of a cover is only one part of that judgment. A complete book with readable pages, a secure binding and a clear title is easier to sort and place than an incomplete or heavily damaged copy. These are practical selection suggestions, not additional acceptance rules issued by the organisers. Anyone unsure about an unusual donation should ask the foundation before arranging a large transfer.
This approach changes the purpose of sorting at home. The aim is to release useful reading material, rather than to send away everything that has become inconvenient to store. A child can be involved by choosing a story they enjoyed and explaining why another reader might enjoy it. An adult can check that all pages are present before packing it. A small, well-chosen contribution is meaningful even when it is far below the campaign’s overall target and produces no dramatic photograph of stacked boxes.
A school collection needs an organised handover
The appeal includes schools and is connected to the foundation’s Educate the Heart competition. A class that chooses to participate can make the activity more effective by agreeing a collection point and a responsible adult before asking pupils to bring books. The published invitation should remain the basis of any school notice. Schools should avoid adding promises about destinations, beneficiary numbers or individual recognition unless those details have been confirmed by the organiser; the public appeal does not establish a bespoke arrangement for every participating class.
A simple internal list can record the number of books gathered and whether they have been checked, without collecting unnecessary personal information about donors. Staff can then coordinate transport and confirm a suitable handover rather than assuming a public stand can accommodate any quantity at any moment. These are suggested logistics for a voluntary activity, not official campaign procedures. They help keep the work manageable for teachers and ensure the learning value is not lost beneath last-minute boxes arriving without anyone responsible for moving them.
The collection point is the beginning of another journey
According to the published account, initial distribution is planned for the new facility of the TBHF Education Centre in Sharjah and a school in Egypt supported through Educate the Heart. Other foundation-supported projects may receive additional donations. Those are plans, not confirmation that the collection has already been distributed. The distinction protects donors from assuming that a book handed over today will immediately appear in a specific school or that every title will follow the same route to a final reading space.
After collection, any book programme must consider how material is organised and made accessible. A room with many books can still be difficult to use if readers cannot find appropriate material or if no one maintains the collection. That observation is general analysis, not a description of the foundation’s facilities. It explains why the quantity collected is a starting measure. The deeper outcome is whether books are placed where people can choose them, read them and return to them over time.
An everyday lesson in giving
For children, the activity can make a broad humanitarian idea concrete without requiring them to imagine they are solving every problem faced by another community. They are sharing a resource that can retain value after their own use. Adults can describe that contribution accurately, avoiding statements that a single donation guarantees a particular educational result. A useful conversation asks what made the book enjoyable or helpful and how another person might approach it differently. That keeps the exercise connected to reading rather than to the performance of generosity.
The same principle can guide workplace collections. A company does not need to turn participation into a contest in which staff feel pressure to bring a certain number. It can share the criteria, provide a clear collection arrangement and let employees decide whether they have suitable books. If it wants to report the outcome internally, it can distinguish books gathered from books accepted and delivered. Such precision is modest, but it prevents a well-meant campaign from producing exaggerated claims about its own impact.
Plan the visit and preserve the purpose
The published donation window runs with the fair through 15 November, leaving the week beginning 9 November for families and schools to organise suitable contributions. Visitors should check the fair’s current opening arrangements before travelling and allow for carrying books through the venue. The verified location for handover is Hall 5, L-12, rather than an unspecified collection point elsewhere in Sharjah. Large groups should coordinate their own logistics carefully and obtain clarification from the organiser where the public invitation does not cover their particular circumstances.
The campaign’s strength is that it connects an ordinary household resource with an organised route to further use. Success should be understood in that practical way: usable books selected thoughtfully, delivered through the stated channel and placed into programmes that can make them available to readers. The 10,000-book ambition gives the appeal scale; the quality of individual contributions helps determine what that scale will mean. For visitors this week, a few carefully chosen books provide a clear place to begin. Gabriel Nicolaev – CyGuru
Gabriel Nicolaev – CyGuru
Sources & further reading
WAM: TBHF collection appeal, 8 November 2026
Sharjah24: donation stand, criteria and planned destinations
Gulf Today: donation drive details