Since 2014, Rx for Reading has created 65 free community libraries in Detroit, Dearborn, Highland Park, Hamtramck, and Ypsilanti. Each library is hosted by a community partner dedicated to serving children and families in under-resourced communities. Brilliant Detroit is one of them.

Happy customers!

“Over the last two years, Little Libraries provided by Rx for Reading have become a staple of each Brilliant Detroit hub, functioning as welcoming and accessible places for our neighbors to access a whole host of books free of charge. Not only do they help get books out into neighborhoods where there are so few; they act as welcome mats for the Brilliant Detroit hubs themselves, signaling that these are spaces for community to come and gather. Currently we have Little Libraries set up or ready to be installed at all of our locations, and we are excited for these to be a part of every Brilliant Detroit hub to come.”

Cindy Eggleton, Co-Founder and CEO of Brilliant Detroit

Rx for Reading also provides opportunities for University of Detroit Mercy college students to get involved and engaged in their community. This spring, students in Alpha Phi Omega, the co-ed service learning fraternity at University of Detroit Mercy, designed and painted three community libraries for Brilliant Detroit hubs. Material costs for the libraries were funded by a Detroit Mercy Mission Micro Grant and generous gifts from individual donors.

APO members hard at work. Pictured: Da’Jonae Foster, Carmela Esteva, Claire Washburn, Janasia Johnson, Irelynd Bone, Matthew Shand Not pictured: Matthew Rimle, Aaron Parker.  Special shout-out to Detroit Mercy’s College of Engineering and Science, which invited APO to use the Engineering High Bay, and John Mio, our stalwart woodworker, who builds all of the Rx for Reading libraries.

Rx for Reading Library at Brilliant Detroit Southwest.

We are proud to stand with Alpha Phi Omega in supporting Brilliant Detroit, an organization that works to foster love and learning, safety and stability, health and growth for young children and their families!

To find out more about Brilliant Detroit, watch this inspiring video.