Blanket Statement

She could easily market “Project Books and Blankies” and retire forever--even before she graduates from middle school--but that’s not in 13-year-old Robyn Strumpf’s game plan.

The Sierra Canyon Middle School student doesn’t want to sell her ingenious idea of packaging books with comfy blankets. Instead, she’s on a mission to fight illiteracy--giving the books and blankets to needy kids throughout Los Angeles.

“I had trouble getting the hang of reading,” said Robyn--a 4.0 student who devours titles on subjects ranging from the Navy SEALs and Dwight D. Eisenhower to classics such as “20,000 Leagues Under the Sea” and “Swiss Family Robinson.” Now, she said, “I get sucked into books. I read in the car, in bed, at the mall, everywhere.”

Robyn’s come a long way since elementary school when she struggled so much with reading that her parents worried she was dyslexic. But back then, she said, she’d get “cozy” with a blanket and a book and listen to a family member read to her. By third grade, she was reading on her own.

“Finally, it just clicked in,” she said.

Knowing that many children today face the same struggle and that there’s more pressure to read earlier than ever before, she developed “Project Books and Blankies” a year ago to fulfill a community service project for school.

Since then, she estimates she has cold-called and received books from nearly a dozen bookstores, collected about 1,500 used books from a book drive at her school and received donations of 300 yards of brightly colored cotton prints for making her hand-sewn quilts. She even has her own homemade logo.

Her brothers, Brian, 14, and David, 17, don’t seem to mind that their Northridge home is ground-zero for all this activity. The family’s formal living room is a way station for books in need of sorting, and the family room upstairs usually has two or three quilts lying around in various stages of progress.

“It’s a lot of work,” Robyn said, “but it’s worth it.”

She has even found a way to tap into mainstream retail.

Last December, during the busy holiday season, Robyn partnered with Borders Books & Music in Valencia on its annual “Snow Angel Program” in which customers bought new books for 175 children that Robyn helped identify. Her quilts adorned the walls of the bookstore.

More recently, she’s stepped up distribution of the collected books by working with the Libraries and Preschools program, part of the nonprofit Library Adult Reading Project Literacy Council, which she learned about by calling her local library.

That group is now distributing about 20 cartons of books--an estimated 1,000 titles--to Boys & Girls clubs and preschools throughout low-income areas of Los Angeles.

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Still other books have made their way to Chatsworth High School and Sycamore Elementary School in Simi Valley. And more are on the way to a public school library in Pasadena that was vandalized earlier this month.

Because she cannot make a blanket for every child in every class, some schools receive just one of her unique creations to hang on the wall to help remind the children that reading can be fun.

“She is a remarkable child,” said Barbara H. Clark of the Literacy Council. “To have this sense of community and responsibility and genuine desire to help others is remarkable in someone so young.”

For her effort, Robyn recently was named the top middle school volunteer in California by Prudential Insurance Co. of America. Each year, the company awards its “Prudential Spirit of Community” awards to outstanding student volunteers across the country.

In May, Robyn will join other honorees for an awards ceremony in Washington, D.C., where Prudential will name 10 top youth volunteers.

For now, Robyn has another book drive planned in mid-April at Temple Ahavat Shalom in Northridge.

“I have fun doing this,” she said. “I’ve lost track of how many hours I do it, because I enjoy it so much.”

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Personal Best is a weekly profile of an ordinary person who does extraordinary things. Please send suggestions on prospective candidates to Personal Best, Los Angeles Times, 20000 Prairie St., Chatsworth 91311. Or fax them to (818) 772-3338. Or e-mail them to valley.news@latimes.com.