To the Editor-

The Portage County Public Library had a very successful Summer Library Program this year with 1,581 kids and teens involved in the reading club, and 4,678 people who attended 141 summer events. 

The 168 teens enrolled in the reading club recorded reading an amazing 1249 books, and 75 teenagers volunteered 283 hours at the library! As always, we could not pull all this off without the wonderful assistance of many local businesses and individual community professionals.

The PCPL would like to therefore thank the following businesses for donating coupons and other prizes that we used as reading incentives: Clay Corners, The Blue Bead Trading Company, Emy J’s, Noodles and Company, Pizza Hut and Family Video.

We also thank the following people and businesses for hosting events at the library: Austin and Jennifer Gausmann from The Blue Bead Trading Company, Bob and Carrie Butt from Divepoint Scuba, Jason D’Acchioli from UWSP, and Keith Rice and Christine Koeller from the GIS Center.

The library also thanks the Library Foundation for a generous grant that allowed kids to raise $978 through their hard work in the Summer Library Program, which we donated to Literacy for Little Ones, The Humane Society of Portage County, and Project Fresh Start.

We appreciate everyone who has helped us to reach our goal of preventing the summer slide through reading and learning, and keeping families busy this summer with fun and free activities!

Nicole Ozanich & the Youth Services Staff of the PCPL