NWA EDITORIAL: Have book, will travel

Bridge Bus a great idea driven by volunteers

There must be at least 50 ways to be a book lover.

In Bentonville, thanks to two creative librarians at Osage Creek Elementary School and Creekside Middle School, one of those ways this summer might involve a driver saying "Get on the bus, Gus."

What’s the point?

Using a modified school bus as a mobile library is a creative approach to promote kids’ reading.

Carol Halbmaier and Kim Moss, according a July 5 story, for years dreamed of doing to something to promote reading during those summer months when kids like to forget about school. But forgetting about school doesn't mean forgetting about learning, and reading is hands down one of the fundamentals to lives filled with learning.

The former kindergarten teachers-turned-librarians, during the school year, work at what's known as The Bridge, a shared library connecting Osage Creek and Creekside schools. As advocates for reading, they recognized what a lot of school teachers and libraries know: If kids stop reading during those summer breaks, a lot of the progress made in their school-year academic work can be lost.

Their answer literally cranked up in June. The School District provided an old bus and helped marshal the resources to transform it into a mobile library. A lot of volunteer work went into the transformation, too. Complete with bookshelves and places to sit, the bus makes the rounds to 11 stops within the schools' attendance zones every Wednesday during the summer months. Other school staffers have pitched in to spread the word that the Bridge Bus has arrived offering books. Those books can be returned later, but nobody is sweating the details if kids decide to keep them. The whole point is to create opportunities for year-round reading at kids' homes.

Certainly other schools or districts have had mobile library efforts. We applaud them all, and appreciate the creative drive to serve young people during those summer months when a trip to a public library may not always be possible or, perhaps, not high on a parent's priority list.

The Bridge Bus is a great example of the passion many educators have for helping students learn -- whether at school or away.

Commentary on 07/16/2019

Upcoming Events