01
Books for schools
Textbooks and classroom libraries for schools that need them, at home and abroad.
Stop discrimination, persecution, and intolerance wherever you see it, no matter how insignificant.
Find ways to help those who are weaker than you.
Never be selfish. However you’ve rewarded yourself will sour in comparison to what you could have done for someone else.
Comfort anyone you can at any time.
Pray that when your life is done, you will leave behind the very best that is within you, and work each day toward that goal.
Eleanor “Ellie” Ayer · 1947–1998
Who we are
A life spent teaching other people to pay attention.
The Eleanor H. Ayer Foundation was created in loving memory of the intelligent, compassionate, talented woman who went by “Ellie.”
Ellie wrote some fifty books — most of them for young readers, many of them about the Holocaust. She believed that history only protects us if we keep telling it, and that a child who is handed the right book at the right moment can be changed by it.
The Foundation carries that forward in the plainest way we know how: by putting books, teachers, speakers and opportunities in front of students who might not otherwise meet them.
What we do
Five ways we support students and the people who teach them.
02
Scholarships
Direct support for students pursuing writing, journalism and the language arts.
03
Grants
Funding for classroom projects, educational trips and supplies teachers would otherwise buy themselves.
04
Lectures
Speakers brought into schools to talk with students about current affairs and critical thinking.
05
Library programs
Spaces and programming built for teenagers — somewhere to study, read and be welcome.
Her words
Ellie left behind a short list of instructions.
They are not complicated. They are the whole brief for this Foundation.
- 49
- Books catalogued
- 3
- National Geographic Bee finalist teams coached
- 1995
- Christopher Award for Parallel Journeys
The creed
Live like this.
Five lines from a list of thirty-nine Ellie wrote for her son Madison before he left for college.
Stop discrimination, persecution, and intolerance wherever you see it, no matter how insignificant.
Find ways to help those who are weaker than you.
Never be selfish. However you’ve rewarded yourself will sour in comparison to what you could have done for someone else.
Comfort anyone you can at any time.
Pray that when your life is done, you will leave behind the very best that is within you, and work each day toward that goal.
Get involved
We are always glad to hear from you.
Grant requests, questions about Ellie’s published work, or an idea for how you could help — write to us.