NEW YORK, April 15 /PRNewswire/ -- Greg Mortenson and David Oliver Relin, coauthors of Penguin's best-selling Three Cups of Tea, have been selected as The Mom's Choice Awards' Authors of the Year, and Mortenson's Pennies for Peace has been recognized as Volunteer Organization/Program of the Year. The Mom's Choice Awards honor excellence in family-friendly media, products, and services.

Three Cups of Tea tells the story of Mortenson's 1993 attempt to climb K2 in honor of his younger sister. When a member of the group got sick, they turned around, and he got lost in the mountains of Pakistan. He wandered into a poor village, where the chief and his people took Mortenson in. Inspired by their kindness, he promised to return and build a school. Mortenson went on to cofound Central Asia Institute, the parent organization of Pennies for Peace, which has used student contributions to establish nearly 100 schools in rural and often volatile areas of Pakistan and Afghanistan. These schools provide education to more than 28,000 children, including 18,000 girls, where few education opportunities existed before.

Earlier this year, The Pearson Foundation, in conjunction with Pennies for Peace and the National Education Association (NEA) Foundation, announced a new K-12 service-learning toolkit designed to help educators create effective penny-raising campaigns as part of their school's curriculum.

The Pennies for Peace Toolkit, available for free at www.penniesforpeace.org, provides a standards-aligned, service learning curriculum for all grade levels, including classroom activities, fact sheets, maps provided by National Geographic, and videos about life and culture in Afghanistan and Pakistan. The Toolkit supplies campaign tools that teachers and students can use to engage their local communities, including letter templates to civic leaders, press release templates, stickers, and flyers.

The Toolkit is an extension of Three Cups of Tea: One Man's Journey to Change the World"¦ One Child at a Time, a young readers' edition of this remarkable story published by Puffin, an imprint of Penguin Young Readers Group.

"This is a great honor for Greg, David, and Pennies for Peace, which is doing so much to promote the importance of activism and education throughout the world," said Mark Nieker, president of the Pearson Foundation. "We are proud to be associated with them through our involvement with The Pennies for Peace Toolkit."

About the Pearson Foundation
The Pearson Foundation extends Pearson's commitment to education by partnering with leading nonprofit, civic, and business organizations to provide financial, organizational, and publishing assistance across the globe. The foundation aims to make a difference by sponsoring innovative educational programs and extending its educational expertise to help in classrooms and in local communities. More information on the Pearson Foundation can be found at www.pearsonfoundation.org.

Pearson Foundation

Pearson Foundation

Pearson (NYSE: PSO) is the global leader in educational publishing, assessment, information and services, helping people of all ages to learn at their own pace, in their own way. For students preK-12, Pearson provides effective and innovative curriculum products in all available media, educational assessment and measurement for students and teachers, student information systems, and teacher professional development and certification programs. Our respected brands include Scott Foresman, Prentice Hall, SuccessMaker, Waterford, AGS, PowerSchool, Chancery SMS, SASI, Pearson Inform, Teachervision.com and many others. Our comprehensive offerings help inform targeted instruction and intervention so that success is within reach of every student. Pearson's other primary businesses include the Financial Times Group and the Penguin Group.

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