She’s a library assistant. She’s a mother of three. She's an athlete (this year, at 43, she’ll be running her 13th Boston Marathon). She raises money for cancer research and literacy. And since 2002, she's been combining all those elements of her life to help enhance others' quality of life.

A part-time library assistant at Blake Middle School, Medfield, MA, Sarah Nixon is the founder of Fit Girls, a six-week program with a three-pronged purpose: to train preadolescent girls for a 5-K, to encourage them to read books featuring “smart, strong, and bold” female protagonists, and to raise money for First Book, a nonprofit that gives kids from low income neighborhoods the opportunity to own and read their first new books. The Fit Girls borrow titles from Nixon's special Fit Lit collection, conduct book discussions while running laps, and keep a record of both the books they’ve read and the kilometers they’ve logged.

In this way, Nixon writes, the Fit Girls exercise their bodies (running/walking), their minds (reading), and their hearts (philanthropy/community outreach), all while reinforcing Nixon's belief that “growing up healthy means growing up with great books.”