Vision
"To create a place where Indonesian students have access to the resources and opportunities a library can provide. "

Developing the Project's Visual Identity
In cooperation with Architect's Without Borders Canada we have been working towards developing the Project's visual identity. A set of visual Images which will be used to give the project a recognizable visual presence. To take a look at the evolution of this part of the project.click here.

Photo Galleries & Video's

Photos of the building which will house the library. See the Building Album
Photos of the neighborhood that the library is in.
Neighborhood Album
You an also watch Yuki's Video of the Site and the streets around it.

The Book Drop Box
Since August we've collected over 300 English and Indonesian books for the Taman Bacaan. Once we get up and running some of the books we collect will be sent off to support the 1001Buku project. Read more about the book drop program.

About US:

We are a group of Middle School students from Bali International School who want to give something back to the community that we live and learn in.

Design
By Jake
Part of this project involved using our design skills. BIS students are doing some of the designing but we're also working with architects, such as Architects Without Borders (AWB), Canada . They helped us with the graphic design portion of the project. AWB worked with BIS students via the Internet to develop the logo, signage and an overall visual identity for the project.
BIS students brainstormed ideas for the project's visual identity, and their sketches were sent to the AWB team who took the ideas and refined them so that they could be used for publications, the Internet, posters and banners. Additionally, BIS students will have an opportunity to work with local architects and builders for the renovations to the interior and exterior of the building.
The first step in designing the interior was to take measurements so we could coordinate the furniture and bookshelves. We had to look at libraries on the web for our design ideas. The greatest design challenge was the size of the library. The building is small (six meters by six meters) so it was hard to design the furniture which will accommodate approximately 20,000 books, five computers, study areas and a work area for a librarian.

Book Drop Box
By Shiori and Jake
A library isn't a library without books. The first task to make this project happen was to start collecting amazing books for the library. Since August we have collected over 650 English and Indonesian books from the community. We hooked up with an organization called 1001Buku who have a great system of book donation. Using their Book Drop Box program we started collecting good quality, used books from teachers, parents and students.
In Indonesia , reading isn't the most interesting and common thing for students to do with their spare time. This could be due to the fact that books can be quite expensive and that there is limited access to books. 1001Buku is trying to fix this problem. The 1001Buku organization is a group of volunteers who are striving to provide more books, quality reading materials, and creative toys for children through non-profit community-run libraries, such as the one our school is trying to build. 1001Buku needs our help. We have set up a 1001Buku Book Drop Box right in front of the front office.
Since our school community is mainly English speaking, most of our donations have been in English. We plan on keeping some of the English books for the Taman Bacaan and will send some of the donated books to 1001Buku to be distributed to their network of community libraries.
If we raise enough money for books, then we hope to rotate some of our book collection through the 1001Buku network in the years to come.

Selecting the Right Indonesian Books
By Kawangi
You might think that spending $10,000 USD is easy, but it is in fact really difficult. The collection committee for the Taman Bacaan Project has been in charge of selecting the Indonesian book collection for the library. Spending that much money on books is difficult, because we have to choose interesting and educational books that would benefit the children. Since the library will be catering for local students and the kids in the nearby Banjar, we are trying to choose books that would be helpful and interesting to them. We have been working from book lists from different bookstores and publishers to make our choices. This was a really hard job for us to choose books that the kids would be interested in and books which would be most helpful to their studies. Most of the lists that we used didn't have pictures or very detailed descriptions so we've had to cross reference our choices with online book stores. We had to pick the most appropriate books with the best prices and we had to take into account the quality of the books. Choosing the books for the collection is a big responsibility. We make poor choices we'll be doing everyone involved a giant disservice. Once the list is complete, we'll order and catalogue all the books.
The Banjar Meeting
By Nathaniel and Hadi
During the third term this year, a meeting about the Taman Bacaan Danau Buyan was held in the BIS community centre. The meeting involved the head of the nearby Banjars, as well as the headmasters of the nearby schools, who attended as representatives of the local community. The purpose of this meeting was to introduce to the local community to the project, and to explain the development of the project so far.
BIS received positive responses from these local representatives, who supported the library project since the problem of limited access to books as well as computer technology has become a problem for the local community. With the help of the library project, they hope that they can overcome that problem. The local representatives were pleased that with the help of the library project, the local community will be able to gain more access to books and computers which can be used for research purposes.
The participants at the meeting remarked that the project was excellent as it facilitates the establishment of a better relationship between BIS and local community. They hope that with this library project running, it will help to reduce the social gap between the BIS and local community. They also hope that the library project will improve local interest in reading books, especially for the younger children in primary schools.
In addition to their positive feedback, they also suggested that BIS provide restrictions to the Internet access through the computers in the library to avoid improper use of the Internet connection. They hoped that this project would encourage other similar library projects to emerge.

Taman Bacaan Update
Students at Bali International School have been busy developing a public-lending library as a means of fostering literacy and bridging the digital divide. When completed, the Taman Bacaan will offer a sizable collection of Indonesian and English fiction and non-fiction books and public access to computers

Connecting with Students from Around the World
By Natasha and Kelly
Raising enough money to run a public library is a big job. We've been raising money from the BIS community but to make the project fly we've had to connect with various outside sources.
Last December Mr. Beaverford, our supervisor, visited schools in the USA (the Center for Early Education in Los Angeles , CA ) and Canada (the Lakeland Ridge School in Alberta ) as a representative of Bali International School 's Taman Bacaan Project to introduce the students there to our efforts at creating a library for the local Balinese community.
After hearing about the project, the schools in North America decided to contribute by organizing fundraising activities and events that encourage literacy and a love of reading in children. Their hard work has been invaluable to this project and the money raised has been very instrumental in the building of the library. One school, the Center for Early Education in California had such success with their fundraising efforts that they donated $12,490 USD to our project!
Other institutions involved in this project include the Asir Academy in Saudi Arabia , Architects Without Borders in Winnipeg , Canada , and Librarians Without Borders in Canada . To date we have approximately $16,000 USD and counting.
As a result of this diverse and dedicated collaboration we expect to open the library in June, 2007 on Jalan Danau Buyan, Sanur, Denpasar in Bali .

Indonesia Kurang Membaca
By Elena
Isu tentang kurangnya minat baca anak-anak Indonesia bukanlah sesuatu yang perlu dipertanyakan lagi. Bahkan, bukan hanya anak-anak yang minatnya terhadap buku bisa dibilang hampir tidak exist. Remaja dan orang dewasa pun, kalau diperhatikan, jarang sekali berkeliling dengan hidung terbenam di sela halaman sebuah novel, seperti yang biasanya dilakukan orang barat. Saya bukan bermaksud membandingkan kebiasaan hidup orang Indonesia dengan orang barat, tetapi perbandingan mengenai kebiasaan membaca bacaan atau karya sastra di luar buku pelajaran merupakan suatu perbedaan yang mencolok antara bangsa Indonesia dengan bangsa lain. Inipun bukan pertama kali isu ini diangkat sebagai topik pembahasan.
Orang bisa bertanya, sebenarnya apa keuntungan dari membaca novel atau buku cerita? Sama saja dengan membuang waktu, bukan? Salah. Mungkin pikiran pertama yang muncul di benak orang mengenai manfaat membaca buku cerita ialah untuk mendapat hiburan dari alur ceritanya. Tapi bukan itu saja. Membaca dapat membantu memaparkan orang berbagai jenis kata dan kalimat baru, dan inipun nantinya bisa memperkaya vocab orang tersebut dan meningkatkan kemampuan berkomunikasinya. Membaca dapat memperkenalkan cara berpikir yang berbeda pada si pembaca. Dengan membaca buku cerita dari berbagai daerah atau budaya, misalnya, si pembaca akan dihadapkan dengan cara berpikir narrator yang berbeda dari cara berpikir si pembaca. Atau malah sebaliknya, si pembaca bisa mengetahui bahwa ada banyak persamaan antara budayanya dan budaya si penulis cerita. Membaca meningkatkan memori seseorang, serta kemampuannya untuk memahami teks. Membaca juga merangsang otak untuk berimajinasi. Penilitian menemukan bahwa pada saat menonton TVtidak banyak bagian otak yang merespon, sedangkan pada saat orang membaca, bagian otak yang berbeda-beda menyala. Hal ini diperkirakan disebabkan oleh imajinasi otak yang pada saat membaca dapat membayangkan hal-hal yang yang terjadi di dalam buku, sehingga bagian otak yang berfungsi menanggapi hal-hal yang terjadi sesungguhnyapun menyala.
Lantas, apakah yang menjadi penyebab sedikitnya minat baca orang Indonesia ? Kalau dikatakan bahwa system pendidikan yang bertanggung jawab atas hal ini, bisa saja. Tetapi budaya bangsa yang berakar dari masa penjajahan Belanda dan Jepang tidak bisa pula dipisahkan dari masalah ini. Bisa dikatakan bahwa pada jaman dulu kebanyakan orang Indonesia dipekerjakan sebagai bawahan Belanda. Kebiasaan orang Indonesia saat itu yang selalu bekerja keras bisa dibilang terbawa hingga hari ini. Banyak orang, terutama kaum lebih tua, berpendapat bahwa membaca hanya akan membuang waktu yang seharusnya bisa diisi dengan bekerja—sesuatu yang pastinya akn lebih membawakan hasil. Khususnya di kalangan masyarakat miskin, hal ini bisa dimengerti. Mencari nafkah untuk mencukupi kebutuhan makan sehari-hari saja susah, apalagi untuk membeli buku.
Disinilah masuknya peranan system pendidikan, dan mengapa mereka juga bertanggung jawab atas kurangnya minat membaca orang Indonesia . system pendidikan Indonesia sudah jelas menekankan sekali pendalaman ilmu alam dan matematika nagi siswanya. Ini bisa dilihat dari banyaknya siswa Indonesia yang berlomba dalam olimpiade-olmpiade berbau mipa dan berhasil meraih prestasi. Namun di kurikulum karya sastra kurang mendapat perhatian. Membaca novel untuk didiskusikan di dalam kelas tidak menjadi tuntutan bagi setiap siswa dari usia muda, seperti halnya di Negara barat, seperti Amerika. Pada saat TKpun mungkin jarang ada ibu guru yang membacakan buku cerita kepada anak-anaknya. Di barat, novel dan cerita fiksi diperkenalkan pada anak pada usia sangat muda. Bahkan, yang paling pertama memperkenalkan anak dengan buku cerita adalah orang tuanya. Tugas membaca novel untuk dibahas di dalam kelas bukan sesuatu yang jarang di negara barat, bahkan siswa banyak yang mengeluh karena banyaknya mereka harus membaca, namun inilah yang mendorong apresiasi akan berbagai jenis karya sastra, dan mendrong siswa untuk mengemukakan pendapat mereka tentang apa yang mereka baca. Tentunya ini seharusnya menjadi bagian penting dalam kurikulum manapun.
Di sekolah-sekolah Indonesia , khususnya sekolah dasar di daerah pedesaan, atau sekolah-sekolah kecil dengan jumlah murid sedikit, perpustakkan juga jarang sekali ditemukan. Jika siswa tidak mendapat akses terhadap buku selain buku pelajaran, bagaimana mereka bisa mengembangkan hobi membaca? Pada saat SD sekolah saya merupakan sekolah yang perpustakaannya merupakan sebuak ruangan kecil yang lebih banyak berisi sampah dibandingkan dengan buku. Ruangan itu jarang sekali dibersihkan, dan buku-buku yang adapun kondisinya sangat buruk. Saya dan teman-teman sempat masuk ke perpustakaan hanya pada saat bersembunyi dalam permainan petak umpet. Begitulah status perpustakaan di sekolah SD kecil di desa. Yang sangat diperlukan sekolah-sekolah Indonesia adalah perpustakaan dan persediaan buku yang cukup untuk menunjang hobi siswanya.
Dukungan pemerintah dan pihak swasta sangat diperlukan dalam membuat visi untuk meningkatkan minat baca bangsa Indonesia menjadi sebuah kenyataan. Alangakah baiknya jika di setiap sekolah bisa disediakan perpustakkan dan buku, majalah, atau Koran yang bisa dibaca oleh para murid kapan saja. Tentunya para siswa dan staf juga harus dididik mengenai cara meminjam dan mengembalikan buku, dan menjaga agar keadaan buku tetap awet. Jika membaca lebih ditekankan dalam kurikulum, bisa saja siswa menemukan kesenangan membaca, dan dengan begitu hobi membaca bukupun tumbuh. Banyak bantuan yang diperlukan untuk meningkatkan aktivitas membaca bangsa Indonesia , namun dengan setiap buku yang disumbangkan, dan dengan setiap perpustakaan yang dibangun, bangsa Indonesia pun akan lebih menghargai karya-karya sastra dan menumbuhkan rasa senang membaca.