High school student organizes book drive to benefit Laurel House

A Germantown Friends high school student is helping families at a Montgomery County domestic violence organization  by collecting children’s books and tutoring children to help those caught in the cycle of family violence.

Andrew Li, a junior living in East Falls, spearheaded with other students a fall book drive that amassed more than 1,000 books to benefit the Montgomery County-based Laurel House. They’re planning to do more collections this spring, he said in a phone interview earlier this month.

“We’re going [to] try to see if there’s other schools that we can reach out to that would be also able to expand the scale of it, but definitely, we’re gonna try to do a few more,” Li said.

Thinking back to the fall initiative, Li recalled fellow students involved with a student-run nonprofit organization called Vern setting up a cardboard box at Stony Creek Elementary School in Blue Bell with the intention of receiving 100 books or so.

The box was teeming with children’s books within just a few days.

“It was something that we 100 percent did not expect to happen,” Li said.

    Andrew Li, a junior at Germantown Friends School, holds a book in fall 2024 as he poses for a picture with dozens of books received as part of a donation drive benefiting several domestic violence organizations in the Philadelphia area, including Laurel House in Montgomery County. (Credit: Andrew Li)
  

When the elementary school called to give a status update on donations, Li was informed the “box was overflowing with books,” and that participating students would need to pick up the donations to allow space for more.

“That was really like the moment where we realized that there’s a lot of hope within activism, and … once we got the idea out, people were very receptive to it, and it was super great to see just the amount of support that we had behind it,” Li said.

It “was the first time that we did something like this,” Li said, referring to the collection efforts, and the initiative went surprisingly well with more than 1,000 books to give away. Li added that Vern members in December 2024 distributed the books to three nonprofits in the region: Laurel House in Montgomery County, as well as Jane Addams Place and Women Against Abuse, both located in Philadelphia.

Laurel House was originally founded in 1980 as a domestic violence shelter under the moniker of the Women’s Center of Montgomery County. The nonprofit expanded its reach, offering a myriad of resources since its incorporation in 1981. Those services include a hotline, a text-line, a children’s program, transitional housing, law enforcement collaboration, as well as legal and medical advocacy, to name a few, according to the nonprofit’s website.

Laurel House has a “safe haven” facility headquartered in Upper Gwynedd with another shelter space in Norristown. But Vern’s connection with the Montgomery County organization focusing on helping those impacted by domestic violence goes back further than the recent book drive.

Vern, the club aiming to “support domestic violence survivors and raise awareness about critical education gaps, has between 30 and 40 students in the Philadelphia area, Li said. Along with a handful of Germantown Friends School students, other students represented included Germantown Academy, as well as Methacton and Wissahickon school districts.

After finding the “organization had a family connection to the Laurel House,” Li learned in January 2024 that the nonprofit was looking for “high school mentors for some of the kids that were staying there.” Li said students have since been helping tutor students in first through eighth grades after school a couple of times per week.

Li said students have also been in talks with nonprofit officials to gain a better understanding of core issues and policies to further their ultimate goals of raising awareness about domestic violence and infusing more education into school curriculums.

“I think the main thing that we’ve really seen is the Laurel House does value what we do, and the entire community does value the work that we do, which has been really great,” Li said. “And right now, we really hope to have some impact on the community, but more so, also inspire others to see if they can make a change.”

“Because after all, it is a little bit difficult doing it as kids, but I think this is definitely something that I’d want to continue working on, especially in the future, and to really see how far we can carry this,” he continued.

Anyone in need of assistance can contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at 1-800-799-7233 or text “BEGIN” to 88788. Visit laurel-house.org for more information.

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