Meet the woman behind Tucson's Make Way for Books program

Meet … Nancy Drew?

You won’t find her name on the Make Way board list, but she should be on the timeline.

“When people ask what book really got me going as a reader, it was ‘Nancy Drew’ for sure,” said Mary Jan Bancroft, the organization’s founder and first director. “When I was a girl, I didn’t really read for fun until I read my first ‘Nancy Drew.’ She was a smart, brave young woman, and I loved her. I’ve been hooked on the power of books ever since.”

That became a very good thing for the children of Tucson.

Since it opened in 1998, Make Way for Books has given some 750,000 books to preschools and preschoolers here. It touches more than 30,000 kids a year, and as the agency celebrates its 25th anniversary, we’re being reminded how much we owe Make Way … and the woman who first opened its doors.

“Without Mary Jan, we wouldn’t be here,” Executive Director Yissel Salafsky said. “It’s that simple.”

To understand Mary Jan Bancroft, know this: After co-founding Make Way for Books with her husband Paul in 1998, she served as the program’s director for 15 years – every day as an unpaid volunteer.

It was Bancroft who networked with Tucson’s preschools and daycare providers. She wrote the grants, asked for donations and bought the books.

Unlike her literary heroine, Bancroft was real — and the real deal.

Working from the foundation she poured 25 years ago, Make Way now has 33 staff members, a budget of $2.5 million, and plans to expand service to communities throughout Arizona in the next five years.

“Remembering where we were, and seeing where things are today, I’m super proud of what this has become,” she admitted. “Not just for me, but for all of us.”

Now retired and 69, Bancroft arrived in Tucson from Reno in 1997. There, she had been a faculty member in the English department at the University of Nevada. Her specialty: teacher preparation.

She was intrigued by studies she began seeing in the 1990s, research that showed the importance of pre-kindergarten programs in a child’s ultimate success in school.

“Early childhood education was a pretty new field back then,” Bancroft said. “We knew how much lifetime learning happened in a child’s first eight years. We didn’t know how much of that was happening before age 5.”

Fast forward to 1997, when she arrived in Tucson and began volunteering at Pio Decimo Preschool south of downtown.

“I wasn’t ready to go back to work,” Bancroft recalls, “and I saw an ad for Pio Decimo. They were looking for volunteers who would read to 4-year-olds in the preschool. It was great, but the school didn’t have a library and the children didn’t have books at home. How would they learn to read without any books?”

Yes, she worried about kids she’d just met in a city she was just getting to know. More importantly, she was determined to help them.

Bancroft soon learned of a Chicago nonprofit called “Hug-a-Book,” which donated books to preschools and then taught the teachers how to use them.

Adopting that model, Mary Jan and Paul launched Make Way for Books, the first stop being Pio Decimo. The Bancrofts donated a library of picture books. They engaged Hug-a-Book staff members to help teach the teachers.

So it began, this wonderful little place that helped change the face of public education in Pima County. It’s no coincidence that every school district in Southern Arizona now has programs promoting early childhood education.

It is tempting to count the numbers, and it is true Make Way for Books has been growing for 25 years. More importantly, perhaps, Make Way programs have grown deeper, too:

Framed originally to support preschools and licensed daycare centers, Make Way learned that a large majority of Tucson 4-year-olds were in home care with parents, family or friends. Determined to reach those kids, too, it launched “Story School,” an initiative that took programs to home care providers gathered in libraries, community centers and other such locations throughout the county.

Knowing that thousands of Tucson families speak languages other than English in the home, Make Way began providing bilingual children’s books. “We thought children should be read to in the language their mother says I love you,” Bancroft said.

When research showed that reading to babies had multiple benefits as the child grew, Make Way added “Books for Babies” to help parents with kids under 3.

“Our people have always been educators and librarians,” Bancroft said. “We’ve tried to be nimble. When we’ve seen a need, we’ve tried to help.”

That spirit continues today, with expansion into communities throughout Arizona.

Bancroft retired 10 years ago, handing the keys to her Assistant Director, Jenny Volpe. Since then, Bancroft has traveled some, read some, spent some time with her two daughters and run two marathons.

That’s how she kicked back in retirement.

“After I left Make Way for Books, someone told me the Tucson Marathon that year would fall on my 60th birthday. I actually had time to train.”

For the record, and to no one’s surprise, she ran.

And finished.

FOOTNOTES

Jenny Volpe, Make Way’s second Executive Director, led the organization’s move from its previous location on East Fort Lowell Road to its current address at 700 N. Stone Ave.

Yissel Salafsky moved from the University of Arizona into the director’s office in January. She will coordinate the agency’s expansion to the rest of Arizona. Make Way for Books already has satellite offices in Chandler and Avondale. Salafsky hopes to add a third, in Phoenix, later this year.

To learn more about Make Way for Books, visit makewayforbooks.org or call 520-398-6451.