Bartlesville Education Promise and Bartlesville Public Schools are announcing a partnership for purchasing e-books for the district's elementary schools. Under the agreement, e-books will be purchased for elementary student utilization at all six Bartlesville elementary schools.
Both the elementary school sites and Bartlesville Education Promise will provide funds for the purchase of e-books. The elementary librarians selected the books based on student interest and reading ability. Dianne Martinez, Executive Director of Elementary Schools, shared, “With the advent of our nation's pandemic, we are concerned that students will have gaps in their reading skills. Our elementary librarians recognize that not having books readily available to students can provide roadblocks in a student’s education during distance learning.”
E-books will be purchased and available online for students to access on the Sora app. Students will be able to browse for books by author, subject, genre, keyword, or reading level. Students will be able to check out books to be read and returned using the app. Usage statistics can be monitored by the librarians on the Sora app. The Sora app is available for free, can be loaded on any device, and is available to all students automatically on their district-provided Chromebooks. The Sora app also allows books to be read offline when an internet connection is not available.
Kathy Hixon, librarian of Wayside Elementary, said, “All of our school librarians are excited that this new program is being implemented. This program will allow us to continue to provide age-appropriate books for our students so that they can continue to learn while at home. The pandemic has raised awareness for the need for this type of partnership; but even post-pandemic, e-books are the wave of the future for making books available to our students. We are extremely honored that Bartlesville Education Promise is willing to help with this needed program.”
It is expected that the e-books will be available from each Bartlesville elementary school in January 2021.