Episode 42: Library card is the ultimate back-to-school supply

In this episode, Sno-Isle Libraries free-lance reporter Abe Martinez takes a look at four areas related to how the library district interacts with and supports the notion of student success.

First, Martinez speaks with Jen Sullivan, a librarian who works out the central Service Center in Marysville and helps coordinate programs and services for students.

Sullivan says those start at preschool-age with storytimes, move on to elementary students with programs such as the thitrd-grade reading challenge, middle-schoolers can look forward to things like the Tween STEAM Club programs and high school get help with classes, but also assistance in applying for college or trade schools and practicing entrance tests.

In the second segment, Martinez speaks with Sheena Fisher and her daughter, Scarlet. Scarlet is an eighth-grader at Cedarcrest Middle School in Marysville and using the Help Now online tutoring service available through Sno-Isle Libraries. "They are on the chat with you," Scarlet says. "A real person on the line with you."

In the third segment, Martinez speaks with Shannon Horrocks, the children's librarian and the Snohomish Library, and Shaelynn Charvet Bates, the school librarian at Riverview Elementary.

Over the summer, Horrocks meets with Bates and school librarians from three other schools in the Snohomish School District. Together, they pick books that will be used in afterschool books clubs at the schools. The clubs meet at their schools, but also gather once a year at the Snohomish Library.

Finally, Martinez speaks with Rickey Barnett, teen and adult services librarian at the Edmonds Library, and Leighanne Law, teacher librarian at Scriber Lake High School in the Edmonds School District.

Barnett says he spends much of his time in schools making in-class presentations. It's a service that Law says she and her students appreciate. "We have LEAD, Library Equity and Diversity in the Edmonds School District and Rickey is involved in that," Law says.