A Note from Our Executive Director
I believe libraries are launchpads—places where communities learn, lead, organize, and imagine new possibilities. That belief brought me to Libraries Without Borders, and it guides everything we do.
Access to information is not a luxury. It is a justice issue. When a family can’t get online, when a child has no quiet place to read, when an elder’s story goes unrecorded—those are not small inconveniences. They are barriers that compound, that close doors, that make full participation in civic life harder than it should be.
That’s why our work takes two paths. We deliver programs directly to communities that have been left out—early literacy kits for families, digital skills training for adults, community archives that preserve local memory. And we partner with institutions to strengthen the library field as a whole, sharing what we’ve learned so the impact reaches further than any one organization could go alone.
From Puerto Rico’s mountain communities to laundromats in urban neighborhoods, we meet people where they are. We listen before we design. We build with communities, not for them. And we stay until the work can sustain itself.
If you’re new here, welcome. If you’ve been with us a while, thank you for staying. Either way, you’re part of something that matters.
With warm appreciation,
Dr. Lovesun Parent
Executive Director
Dr. Lovesun Parent
Executive Director
Patrick Weil
Founder & President of the Board
A Note from Our Founder
In a time marked by political polarization, technological surveillance, and the spread of disinformation, libraries remain one of the most powerful yet underestimated pillars of democracy. Far from being neutral or passive institutions, they are spaces where people access knowledge freely, think critically, and connect across difference.
When I founded Bibliothèques Sans Frontières in 2007, I had seen what happens when people lose access to information—in conflict zones, in underserved communities, in moments of crisis. I had also seen what becomes possible when that access is restored. Libraries do not simply house books. They create the conditions for people to shape their own futures.
Libraries Without Borders US carries that mission forward in the American context—where the challenges look different but the stakes are just as high. Here, library closures and underfunding have left entire communities without the resources they need. Book bans threaten the diversity of ideas that libraries have always protected. And millions of adults still lack the digital skills that full participation in modern life requires.
Our team meets these challenges with innovation, with partnership, and with a deep respect for the communities we serve. They bring early literacy resources into homes. They build digital archives that preserve cultural memory. They train librarians and educators. And they do it all with an understanding that this work is not charity—it is a defense of democratic possibility.
I am proud to stand alongside them, and grateful to everyone who supports this work. Together, we are proving that libraries—reimagined, reinvested, and reconnected to community—remain essential to the world we want to build.
Patrick Weil
Founder & President of the Board
Libraries Without Borders US
