Hi, my name is Stefan Lyon. I am 12 years old and I live in San Francisco.

When I was 9 I told my mom I wanted to raise money to build a school in Africa. She said it was a good idea but we needed a plan. We went to a grocery store nearby and the manager said he would give us free cookie dough to help us out. After baking the cookies we sold them from my red wagon in front of the store. In 2005 we raised more than $2,000 selling cookies but we still needed to raise more money.

I wrote a book, "My Adventures with Stitch", about my pet rat in order to raise the extra money. The book is filled with true stories and pictures I took with my camera.

In 2006 I raised enough money to convert an old cow shed in Kakamega, Western Kenya, into a two-room schoolhouse named “Stefan’s Wing”. I even made enough money to buy materials so they could build desks for the children.

"The children were very happy with their beautiful new school," my mom and grandma said after visiting Africa to see “Stefan’s Wing” in 2007. Now the children in my schoolhouse use my book to learn how to read English.

My mom and grandma visited a nearby village in Bungoma where they saw many children studying outside on benches under the hot sun. These kids really needed a school. I told my mom I wanted to build them a large school, grades 1-8. My dad said I needed to raise $60,000 to build this school so I wrote my next book, "Stitch and Molly Tour San Francisco".