​(1) Collecting books, (2) fundraising for shipping costs, and (3) sorting, packing, and shipping the books.

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The first step is to reach out to family, friends, and neighbors as well as schools and organizations that may be interested in running a book drive. 1000 books and $500 are needed to create one ALP library. Of the $500, about $200 is needed to ship the collected books to the ALP warehouse in New Orleans and $300 is needed to contribute to storage and shipping overseas. In the past, the Penn State's African Library Project has held fundraisers serving ice cream at the Coldstone Creamery downtown to help meet these shipping costs.

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​After we collect the books, we generally take several "bookpacking" days to sort and pack the donations into labeled cardboard boxes. To expedite the packing process, we generally sort the books beforehand into one of three reading level categories: Kindergarten to 3rd grade​, 4th to 8th grade, and teacher manuals and references.​ We then line the inside of the cardboard boxes with plastic trash bags to prevent the books from water-damage during transport. To minimize the cost of shipping, we also aim to maximize the space filled in each cardboard box. We count the number of books in each box and fill out a Book Packing Slip to be placed inside each container before the box is sealed. All of our packing follows the official African Library Project guidelines found here.