Let's give this classroom a novel gift for Christmas

If you'll oblige me for a moment, I have a passion project for this holiday season.

I was scrolling through DonorsChoose.org and came across a high school classroom in southwestern Pennsylvania (Brownsville) that's requesting books to help expand its "25 Books a Year Challenge."

They need a total of $442 in donations by Dec. 30 in order to reach their goal, and they are currently not close. But we can make it happen!

I'll let the teacher, Mrs. Salvucci, tell you more:

"My students are at the academic level and are very interested and excited about reading. We are having a 25 book/year challenge, where students try to read 25 books this school year.

"Many of my students come from homes where reading is not a priority.

"They also do not have much access to books that they can't get at school. I would love for them to read books that are current and tackle issues that they are actually going through. There are so many books that I think my students would benefit from reading if they could get their hands on them. These are books that will encourage students to become more avid readers.

"My goal for my students is to read 25 books this year, and they are ready to take on that challenge. However, my classroom library is lacking books that they will want to read. I need more diverse and current topics for my students to explore.

"I want my students to gain insight into other cultures and people who are different than them by exploring new and diverse young adult literature.

"My hopes are that my students WANT to read these books and then encourage other students to read them as well. I know that they would love these titles and I would be introducing them to books they probably wouldn't have heard of on their own."

They pretty much had me at hello, but I hope Mrs. Salvucci's pitch inspires you, too, if you've read this far.

We can make this happen, but we have to do it by Dec. 30 or the fund-raiser is scuttled.

Please, if you can, donate and/or share the information about this campaign on social media, so that some young readers can discover more great reading.

Some of the great books they're hoping to get their hands on are All the Bright Places by Jennifer Niven, Fever 1793 by Laurie Halse Anderson, American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang, The Hate U Give by Angie Thomas, and Akata Warrior by Nnedi Okorafor.

Let's give these students some great reading for Christmas!

(And thanks for listening to my pitch.)