Teenager Melissa Toler, of Burke, is trying to give new life to old books and new hope to young students in Cambodia. Toler, a freshman at Robinson Secondary School, has organized a book sale to satisfy requirements for the Girl Scouts Silver Award, but the greater goal of the event is helping aspiring Cambodian scholars who are still struggling in the wake of the country’s mid-1970s genocide.
“The money will be used to send children to school who could not go to school otherwise,” Toler said in a press release. “Here in America, we are promised an education; the children in Cambodia don’t have that privilege.”
Children’s author Natalie Lorenzi will be at the fair to sign and sell her book “Flying the Dragon.”
The book sale is scheduled to take place on Sept. 19 at Burke United Methodist Church, 6200 Burke Centre Parkway, from 9 a.m. until 2 p.m. For more information, visit www.burkeumc.org.