Hawai‘i’s bookworms have outdone themselves this summer, as the Hawai‘i State Public Library System's Summer Reading Challenge saw participation skyrocket by a staggering 44 percent over last year's numbers, according to a recent Hawaiʻi State Public Library System report. The State Librarian Stacey A. Aldrich couldn't hide her enthusiasm, stating “Over the summer, tens of thousands of readers from across Hawaiʻi showed us how much reading matters; I’m grateful to everyone who joined in and were a part of strengthening our tradition of literacy in Hawaiʻi.”
Digging into the statistics the library system provides a clear picture, 23,467 people took part—up from 16,248 last summer—across various age groups, with 9,692 children, 3,091 teens, and 10,684 adults diving into books and reading minutes; children (birth through grade 5) logged a combined total of 5,357,135 minutes spent reading, while teens and adults together racked up an impressive count of 102,888 books read, during the two-month challenge which ran from June 1 through July 31, and the readers also managed to make 21,077 visits to their local libraries to check out and note down the Word of the Week
