This is a guest post from Michelle Buettner, librarian at St. John’s Area School in Foley, MN. Read more about our Extended Mini Grant Program or fill out one of our applications. This program is only available during the FY21 school year.
St. John’s Area School is a small rural school community in Foley, MN. The school has 74 students in Kindergarten through Grade 6, along with 14 faculty and staff.
St. John’s Area School is very thankful to the CMLE Minigrant Program. Without the Minigrant, I would not have been able to replace more than 150 books that were damaged in our school library.
In the middle of October 2020, a second floor pump valve broke on our school’s boiler system. This breakage caused gallons and gallons of a water/oil mixture to leak through the ceiling down into the library, soaking and damaging several shelves of books, and worst of all, closing down the school library for about three weeks to clean up the mess. The students were very disappointed to have the library closed for that long.
Once the library was opened back up, they were sad that many of their favorite books were no longer available because they were damaged. I talked to the students about which books and series they would like to see replaced and added in our library.
Thanks to the CMLE Minigrant Program, and generous donations by several families and individuals in our school and community, I was able to replace every book that was damaged. I was also able fulfill many of the students’ requests and purchase books to complete several series. Many of the new books that were ordered came in just before Christmas and during Christmas break. The students were not able to see the new books until the middle of January due to Christmas break and two weeks of distance learning (due to COVID-19 health concerns).
Once the children returned, each class came to the library that first week back and the students were very excited when they saw all the new books waiting for them to check out!
Thank you CMLE!
Michelle Buettner
Librarian
St. John’s Area School