Passports with Purpose Unites More Than 100 Travel Bloggers to Build Two Libraries in Zambia

Seattle, WA, November 30, 2011 --(PR.com)-- Passports with Purpose (PwP), the annual travel bloggers' community fundraiser, will raise $80,000 to build two libraries in southern and eastern Zambia through a partnership with Room to Read. The philanthropic effort begins on November 30, 2011 and ends on December 16, 2011 on www.PassportsWithPurpose.org/Donate. Room to Read seeks to transform the lives of millions of children in developing countries by focusing on literacy and gender equality in education.

More than 100 travel bloggers around the world will participate by posting a description of their procured prize, along with details of Passports with Purpose on their own blogs. All the Passports with Purpose prize posts are linked to the Donate page and include tours, hotel packages, electronics, travel gear, clothing, loyalty points and gift certificates, an “it list” for holiday gift giving. For each $10 tax-deductible donation on the Passports with Purpose site, a person can enter to win a prize of their choice. Donations for multiple prizes and multiple $10 increments are acceptable, as well as donations without entering for a prize. On December 23, a winner will be randomly selected and notified for each prize. Donations go directly to the 2011 beneficiary, Room to Read.

The groundwork building up to establishing the two libraries has begun. The libraries will be located next to the Masulwe Basic School and Chilileka Basic School. Hundreds of children will soon have access to a dedicated library staffed by a trained librarian and filled with colorful, age-appropriate books in their own language. Through Room to Read’s Challenge Grant model, the communities are proudly co-investing by contributing to the libraries through volunteer labor and donated materials, resulting in the library’s long-term sustainability.

In its fourth year, the Passports with Purpose participating bloggers continue to raise the bar with amazing prizes, some valued in the thousands of dollars, with others curated specifically for Passports with Purpose. Sample prizes include:
· Two-night stay at the Grand Hyatt Kauai Resort & Spa, from No Vacation Required
· Three-night Marquis Los Cabos stay with one dinner for two, a bottle of Marquis wine and private shopping tour of Luxury Avenue with $1,000 peso gift card, from What a Trip
· Pair of Clothing Art’s Pick-Pocket Proof Pants & Shorts, from Art of Backpacking
· $500 Gift Card to Bed and Breakfast, from LandLopers
· 110,000 Hyatt Gold Passport points good for five nights at any Hyatt worldwide, from Loyalty Travel
· Five-day Tournament of Roses and Los Angeles tour package, from Mira Terra Travels
· $500 voucher for an apartment stay in European cities, from OttsWorld
· “Celebrity Chef Gourmet Cooking Experience” for two at the Freestyle Escape Outdoor Kitchen in Queensland, Australia, from Roaming Tales
· Kindle Fire, from Vacation Gals
· TravelPro WalkAbout Lite 4 29”, from Travel Gear For Women
· $150 ExOfficio gift certificate, from Uncornered Market
· Xbox 360 4 GB Console with Kinect + Bonus Xbox Goodies, from WanderMom
· 15-day 1st class adult Eurail Global Flexi Pass, from BootsnAll

Helping jump-start the project are Passports with Purpose’s 2011 platinum sponsor Round the World with Us; silver sponsor Travellerspoint; and bronze sponsor HomeAway. Round the World with Us is a family of travelers committed to raising awareness of global issues, help people to gain a greater understanding of other cultures, and encourage people (especially youth) to see that they have the power to make a real difference in the lives of others. Travellerspoint is one of the web's largest and most active travel communities with members representing every country in the world. To date, their more than 30,000 blogs have shared 175,000 stories and over 1.4 million photos. HomeAway is the world’s leading online marketplace of vacation rentals, with sites representing more than 625,000 paid vacation rental home listings throughout more than 145 countries.

About Passports with Purpose 2011
In 2008, Debbie Dubrow, Michelle Duffy, Pam Mandel, and Beth Whitman, the bloggers behind Delicious Baby, WanderMom, Nerd’s Eye View and Wanderlust and Lipstick, respectively, began a travel-inspired initiative to raise money online. Passports with Purpose also filled the need to do long-lasting good for people in the places travelers visit by uniting an online community and leveraging the social media platforms of more than 100 travel bloggers around the world. PwP initiatives benefited Heifer International; the Passports School with American Assistance for Cambodia and a village in Tamil Nadu, India for 25 Dalit families with Land for Tillers’ Freedom. For more information about Passports with Purpose visit, www.PassportswithPurpose.org and for more information about Room to Read visit http://www.roomtoread.org/.

Media contact: Meg Paynor, meg@paynorpr.com, 206.913.3848.
Twitter.com/PassportPurpose
Facebook.com/PassportswithPurpose
Hashtag: #PwP

###