One of the Bay Area’s most famous power couples are giving a special holiday present to schools in Oakland, California.
Golden State Warriors point guard Stephen Curry and his wife, actress and restaurateur Ayesha Curry, are giving thousands of books to Oakland schools, People magazine reports. They’re making the donations in conjunction with their Eat. Learn. Play. Foundation and Austin, Texas–based book club company Literati.
“We along with our entire team at Eat. Learn. Play. understand the importance of early childhood education, especially when it comes to literacy,” the Currys said. “Nothing is more basic, more essential, more foundational, or more important to a child’s success in life than the ability to read well.”
The couple is sending 14,000 boxes of books to Oakland Unified Schools. Each box will contain five children’s books and one for adults, the latter chosen from Stephen Curry’s Literati book club. Books chosen by Curry for his club have included Wes Moore’s The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates, Arshay Cooper’s A Most Beautiful Thing: The True Story of America’s First All-Black High School Rowing Team, and Seth Berkman’s A Team of Their Own: How an International Sisterhood Made Olympic History.
In October, Stephen Curry told the Washington Post that the couple liked to spend time reading with their own children.
“For Ayesha and me, it’s important to instill that joy of reading in our kids,” he said. “The books and genres can be all over the place, but as long as the kids are having fun doing it, spending time with their parents and in a cool way, that means a lot.”
Michael Schaub is a Texas-based journalist and regular contributor to NPR.
