Washington County Libraries Summer Reading Program Breaks Records & Crosses into Uncharted Territory

For immediate Release
Date: September 28, 2009

Contact: Jodi Nielsen, Senior Program Educator
Washington County Cooperative Library Services
www.wccls.org
503-846-3235

Washington County, Oregon: This year throughout the long hot days of summer 24,783 kids took part in the 2009 Washington County Summer Reading Program at one of the fourteen WCCLS member libraries. In fact — a record 12,849 kids finished the program. This means over half the kids who participated saw the program through to the very end.

By contrast, 22,258 kids participated during the summer of 2008. This means, for the second year in a row the total number of youth participating in the summer reading program at Washington County libraries once again grew by double digits — with an increase of just over 11% over the prior year. In a typical year — the program participation increases by 5 or 6%.

However, this is the first time that the Cooperative Library Services outreach effort has unintentionally achieved international exposure. The Washington County Cooperative Library Services (WCCLS) recently received an email from the Brummund family in Eston, Saskatchewan Canada — over 1,000 miles away! Apparently one of the bright yellow summer reading balloons given away to children at the kick-off of the local summer reading programs broke free of a child’s hand and caught an incredibly good wind current. The balloon made it up and over the Continental Divide and found its way to a 4,500 acre family grain farm in west central Saskatchewan.

The Brummund children, Mikayla (5) and Desmond (3) are pictured holding the balloon in their canary bird seed/feed field on their farm near Eston. The balloon was found by the children’s father, Denton, as he was checking his crops on August 6, 2009. As can be seen by the photos, it was mostly inflated with the white ribbon still attached, when he found it lying in the field.

A simple Google search by the children’s mother, Michelle Brummund, located the WCCLS website. Her kids where delighted to know that they had received a reply to the email they sent to the Cooperative Library Services regarding the families discovery. Michelle has been using the experience to teach her children a little about the United States and more details about how the balloon traveled over 1,000 miles.

The family grows several crops on their farm, durum (a type of wheat ground for pasta and crackers), red and green lentils, yellow field peas (dried and used in soups and stews) and canary (used to feed birds — often mixed in with sunflowers and other grains in commercial bird seed).

WCCLS wishes to congratulate all of the local summer readers for their participation, as well as special congratulations to the two long-distance participants Mikayla and Desmond in Saskatchewan Canada.

Note: jpg photo's are available of the Brummund children with the yellow Summer Reading balloon — please email nielsen@wccls.org to request print quality copies.