Summer Reading Success!

At the Hutchinson Public Library, this year’s Dream Big, READ! children’s summer reading program ended on August 4, with a grand total of 1,147 children and young adults enrolled. Of those signed up, 703 completed the program requirements by reading 10 books, spending at least 10 hours reading, or a combination of both. Children who finished the program earned prizes for their efforts, but the best reward was maintaining reading skills, and enjoying books during summer vacation.

Summer reading isn’t limited to children and teens either. One-hundred-two adults 18 and older signed up for the Between the Covers summer reading program. There weren’t any prizes awarded for reading a certain number of books, but more than 300 book ratings and reviews were submitted in June and July. Ratings slips were entered into a weekly drawing for a chance to win prizes. The reviews were posted on the library web site and used to create a reader’s choice book shelf.

Reading wasn't the only thing going on this summer here either.  Our 32 story time programs were attended by 1,555 children.  That's nearly 50 per program!  Our evening family-time programs went over nearly as well with an average of 40 per night.  It's no wonder that our Children's Department staff look so tired - that's a lot of puppet plays and singing and crafts.

Summer reading for children has been happening at the Hutchinson Public Library for more than 60 years. The program has been responsible for check out of millions of books, thousands of story times, close to 30 years of summer celebrations, and tons of paper, crayons and glue used for craft classes. We hope this effort has accomplished the same goal as Read Kansas Read: to inspire a love of reading for life, and to keep the children of Hutchinson and Reno County reading throughout the summer so they are ready to start school each fall.