Louie the Library Lion

St. Louis County Library's summer reading program has been expanded, with new incentives for vacation reading.

Last year, 18,000 kids enrolled in the county library's summer program. There was one program for all ages from birth to 18.

This year, the county library and its 18 branches have two programs to encourage summer reading. One program is for kids up to 7th grade and the Teens Summer Reading Program is for 7th to 12th graders. (Seventh-graders can join either program.)

Bianca Roberts is the county's youth services manager. She said, "We decided we couldn't have an adequate single program if we tried to serve that big an age difference."

This summer's program theme is "2001 Places to Go."

Kids are encourage to read about places from "any time or any location: historical, futuristic, wherever your mind can take you," Roberts said.

The two programs will have separate kickoff events. The one for younger kids will be Saturday, June 2, from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m.

Each local branch library will have its own kickoff event. But, there will be larger events at three "outside" locations: Laumeier Sculpture Park in south county, Faust Park in west county and the North County Recreation Center.

Features at the younger event include performers, story tellers, clowns, magicians and hands-on arts and crafts. At Laumeier Park, there will be guided tours of the sculptures. The North County event will include free pool passes.

Mascots Louie the Library Lion and O.C. Bee will appear at all three locations. O.C. Bee is a bumble bee mascot for Old Country Buffet, one of the program sponsors.

The Teens Summer Reading Program kickoff will be held Wednesday, May 30, from 4-6 p.m. The location will be Dick Weber Bowling Lanes in Florissant.

Each teen who signs up for the Teens Summer Reading Program will be a coupon for "two hours of extreme bowling," Roberts said. In addition, radio station FM95.5 will broadcast from the Dick Weber Lanes during the event.

A feature of the Teens program will be a Karoake Contest, open to soloists and duets. Competition starts with local contests at branch libraries, running from June 11 and ending August 2. (For the date of the local contest at your branch library, see sidebar below.)

Local winners will compete August 6-10 at four regional locations. The finals will be August 17 at the library headquarters. The champion soloist or duet will receive two tickets to a musical concert at the new Pageant Theater in University City.

The summer reading program for younger kids runs June 1-August 11. The Teens program runs June 1-August 17.

Roberts said summer reading programs encourage kids to continue reading even when school is out. The county offers incentive prizes if kids meet certain reading goals.

For young kids, the are based on minutes spent reading, not how many books they read.

The basic goal for the younger kids is to read at least 1,155 minutes (19 1/4 hours) during the summer. The first incentive level is at 105 minutes (1 3/4 hours). The second level is 570 minutes (9 1/2 hours) and the final level is 1,155 minutes.

After completing the first level, kids get a World stencil, a temporary World tattoo and a coupon for a kid's meal at Chick-A-Fil.

Second level incentives include a World pencil, entry in a raffle for Cardinal baseball tickets and an admission coupon to the new Planetarium at the St. Louis Science Center.

The third-level incentives include a certificate of completion, an invitation to the season-ending party at their local library branch, a metal Globe yo-yo and a kid's meal coupon at Old Country Buffet.

For the older kids, the incentives will be based on completing three reading tasks. The reading can be of a book, a magazine or an article of their choice.

The first teen incentive was a coupon for one game of bowling any day in June, July and first half of August at any AMF bowling lanes. The second incentive was a rope bracelet. The third incentive was one CD single from Streetside Records or Warehouse Music.

All kids can go through the incentive cycle more than once during the summer.

For up-to-date information about the two summer reading programs, log onto the county library's website at: www.slcl.lib.mo.us and click on the Kids Page.