Ontario teen sisters deliver thousands of books to remote communities

Julia and Emma Mogus are changing the world, one book at a time.

The teenage sisters from Oakville, Ont., are the founders of Books With No Bounds, a nonprofit organization that collects and distributes books throughout "fly-in" communities in Northern Ontario.

Their commitment to bettering the lives of kids in remote areas of their province helped them win the second annual Shreddies' Search for Goodness.

The Lighter Side spoke with Julia, 16, who talked of her childhood filled with books.

"[Books] are just a great way to open your mind. A gateway to a whole new world," she said.

When Julia and Emma learned that a book drive benefiting the 49 Nishnawbe Aski Nation communities had been cancelled, the sisters stepped up and started collecting books.

The girls did some of their own research.

"We found stats such as most children will only get about one book their entire life," Julia said.

Regional Grand Chief Stan Berdy met with Julia and Emma and told them, "The kids don't just need books a little, they need books a lot."

In 2012, discouraged that "no one's really understood or cared about what's going on" up north, the sisters launched Books With No Bounds "to show them that we actually do care and we wanna create a change," Julia said.

To date, Julia and Emma have shipped thousands of books to remote areas where books are scarce.

The Lighter Side: Do you know how many books you’ve sent so far?

Julia: We’ve actually sent 35,000 books to every single community in the Nishnawbe Aski Nation. We’ve also sent books to Manitoba communities and as far away as Uganda and Ghana in Africa.

How do you handle Books With No Bounds' growth? How do you juggle all of your volunteering and schoolwork?

Definitely Books With No Bounds, since it first started in June 2012, has taught us how to time-manage really well. On top of it, it kind of doesn’t feel like work. It feels like something we just love. When you love something so much, it doesn’t really add to the extra workload.

What advice would you give to other young people who might also want to make a difference but don’t know where to start?

Usually when we speak to schools, we’ll tell them, "Find something that you’re really passionate about." We found something that we really loved — books — and we saw that there were children out there who weren’t given the same opportunity to foster the same love of reading. We just tell people, "Find what you love to do. Find your mission and just run with it because you’ll never know where it will take you."

And it really just goes to show how one small act of immeasurable kindness has no bounds to the amount of change it can really ignite.

How would Yahoo readers be able to contribute?

We do pay for our shipping costs, we do pay for the tape, for all the boxes. And also, we’re trying to build and revitalize four libraries in four different communities, so that’s our next step. So donating money on our website would be awesome. If the Yahoo readers could do that, that’d be great. Also, checking our Facebook and Twitter would be awesome too.

Final question: What are your favourite books?

Definitely the Harry Potter series. Number 5. That’s definitely one of my favourites. Emma really likes The Life of Pi.

Learn more about Books With No Bounds here.