College Students Collect More Than 1,000 Books for Local Library

Northwest Florida State College’s Phi Theta Kappa organization wrapped up their community service project – where they collected more than 1,000 books for Niceville’s library and children in foster care by hosting a reading event at the library.

Members of Phi Theta Kappa, which is an academic honors society with chapters around the country, read several books to young children at the event in the children’s section of the Niceville Library facility.

Cayzel Ancheta, the president of the Northwest Florida State College Chapter of Phi Theta Kappa said the students she served with enjoyed helping the community out with this project. “We collected over 1,000 books,” Ancheta said, “which is crazy because our goal was 300. “So, that’s a really big step for us.”

Every semester the honor society members vote on what they would like to do for a community service project – then lead and execute it.

The students hosted pop-up book drives at local churches and other civic organizations to collect the books.

“We definitely would not have been able to do this [without] everyone here,” Ancheta added, “It was a team effort.”

They also have an academic component to their project: The members of Phi Theta Kappa must also put together a report on the preservation of stories.

They will have a new project next semester, but the organization’s members have yet to decide what the project will be.