Stories that Matter: Marley Dias

Marley Dias is no fool. An avid reader, this now-12-year-old noticed that the majority of books she enjoyed reading boasted white main characters. Very rarely did she come across a book with an ethnic main character, and never as assigned reading.

She decided to do something about that. She set out to collect 1,000 books with a black girl as the central character. But that wasn’t enough. From this goal #1000blackgirlsbooks was born.

At last count Marley had far exceeded her personal goal at around 4,000 books, but also achieved something so much greater — bringing a new awareness to not only other young black girls but also the world.

She recently obtained a book deal from Scholastic to take her message even further.