SAN ANTONIO – The idea started out as a simple blog. Twin sisters, who loved to read, began writing book reviews.
The idea then grew to a city-wide initiative, and now, the San Antonio teenagers are representing literacy on a national level from a big Hollywood name.
For 17-year-olds Neerja and Nidhi Bathla, reading has been a constant since for as long as they can remember.
“Our parents are immigrants, and they believe heavily in the importance and value of education,” Neerja Bathla said. “So, we pretty much spent all our free time for the first five years of our life in Barnes and Nobles.”
In spring 2020, while in middle school, the COVID-19 pandemic put the world on lockdown.
“Because we were bored, we were going to start a book blog,” Neerja Bathla said. “So, we wrote reviews of books we’d read, and then we recommended them to other kids.”
They began seeing the pull technology had on their friends.
“Social media was starting to affect the self-esteem of the girls around us. And these girls were reading less, and they were on technology more,” Neerja Bathla said. “Not that things like beauty and trends are bad things, but they take away that importance and also that self-confidence that we get from being able to read and gaining knowledge.”
In 2024, their Girls for Books blog won the state civics competition, which funneled grant money their way.
“And we used that grant to launch our website,” Nidhi Bathla said.
Their official nonprofit adopted an ambassador program. The nonprofit now has between 20-25 ambassadors across the country.
“A girl applies and they can either write book reviews or they can start a book club in their own school,” Neerja Bathla said. “We got ‘PVSA certified.’ So, the Presidential Volunteer Service Award (PVSA), which is the highest award for teens to get from the U.S. government for volunteering. So, they are able to get volunteer hours.”
It’s also résumé material for these girls.
“Now they get to become a published author!” Nidhi Bathla said.
The City of San Antonio took notice and included the girls on the mayor’s fitness council, which helped secure more grants for their nonprofit.
With some of that money, the twins just launched their new Educator Book Kit program for teachers at low-income schools.
“We basically build a kit with merch and reading guides, and then we also send books to an educator who wants to start a book club with students at their school but doesn’t have the financial resources,” the girls said.
The girls are asking any educators who would like to be sent a book club starter kit to reach out to them on their website.
The teens are also available to give talks at schools about reading and literacy.
As for the big announcement, this week, Neerja and Nidhi were officially asked to join actress Reese Witherspoon’s national teen reading council through a book club project called Sunnie Reads.
The girls described the moment as a dream come true.
“It’s really important to have other girls who feel the same way that we do about reading and social media and that they can coexist,” Nidhi Bathla said.
The opportunity will help them further their goal of creating a future of empowerment, empathy and leadership for girls and teenagers everywhere.