A university-wide book drive collecting supplies for schools affected by recent hurricanes ran through October at St. Thomas.

Sophomore Dustyn Montgomery organized the book drive in order to collect resources for schools in Florida and Texas. There were boxes located across campus as well as one at Mitchell Hamline School of Law. Currently just over 100 books have been collected, but the final book count won’t be until the beginning of November.

“I’ve realized how much of a lack of resources there are, not only on the local level, but nationally too,” Montgomery said. “I’m trying to fill in the gap.”

Montgomery has experience running book drives; he has organized them on three occasions. While in high school, he collected over 3,500 books for local schools. Last year at St. Thomas, he created a book drive which collected about 250 books to support his high school.

Montgomery is involved in the Excel! Research Scholars Program at St. Thomas, which prepares undergraduate students from underrepresented groups for graduate school. After the hurricanes hit, he met with Excel! Director Cynthia Fraction and said he wanted to make hurricane relief the focus of his upcoming book drive.

“He is always forward thinking. And when he’s forward thinking, he’s thinking about others,” Fraction said of Montgomery.

Montgomery said he began creating the book drive by researching schools online that were affected by the hurricanes. He found a handful of schools in Florida as well as two in Texas that said they were in need of books for all ages.

“We have identified key locations for him for where to drop the boxes for donations,” Fraction said. She added that administrators like President Julie Sullivan, Yohuru Williams, Wendy Wyatt, and Karen Lange have supported the drive.

From this process, Montgomery plans to use his passion for education to create a website where schools can share educational resources with each other.

“The schools would pay a shipping fee … then post an explanation on the website on how the resources were used and how it helped their school,” Montgomery said.

Montgomery plans to continue working with schools as he develops his resource sharing website.

“I hope this sets the stage for how we think about our experience here at St. Thomas,” Fraction said. “St. Thomas is such a wonderful school with a plethora of opportunities for students … to help someone else.”

Kailyn Johnson can be reached at john4298@stthomas.edu.