A crowd of elementary students gathered around Principal Andy Edwards on Tuesday, eagerly awaiting to rip into the 6-foot Christmas present sitting near the front office at New Hope Upper Elementary School.
With Edwards’ go-ahead, the students tore through the paper, revealing a vending machine filled entirely with new, ready-to-read books that dispense at the drop of a special token and the push of a button.
The Inchy’s Bookworm Vending Machine was installed through a partnership between the school, Atmos Energy and Steel Dynamics Inc. with the goal of building a love for reading among the elementary students.
“(It’s) a wonderful resource that will provide books for our students and help foster a love of reading throughout the school,” Edwards said. “… It’s a representation of partnership, generosity and a shared commitment to literacy and enriching our students’ lives. This ribbon cutting is a celebration of what a school, the industry partners, parents and communities working together with a shared purpose can achieve.”
The machine dispenses age-appropriate books that students earn using tokens, which are awarded for positive behavior, kindness challenges and good deeds. Once a student uses their token, the book is theirs to keep.
Edwards had the idea for the machine after a colleague in a different county had one installed at another school. From there, he started asking questions.
“I called him and I said, ‘How’d you do it?’” Edwards said. “And from that point on, it’s asking questions. One of the things that we teach our students is we want you to continually ask questions. … From our administration asking questions, it just continued, and we never found a no. So now we’re here.”
Edwards connected with Atmos Energy for the project, and the company agreed to purchase and donate the machine. Steel Dynamics Inc. then agreed to donate a year’s supply of books to keep the machine stocked.
Lauren Ann Cobb, public affairs manager for Atmos, said New Hope Elementary’s is the third Incy’s Bookworm Vending Machine the company has had installed in Mississippi schools.
The goal of installing the machine, Cobb said, is to hopefully instill a love for reading students can carry throughout their academic careers and, eventually, into the workforce.
“The statistics are exponentially higher for them to graduate high school if they’re reading at the appropriate grade level by third grade,” Cobb told The Dispatch. “… Hopefully the excitement of putting a coin in the machine (and) getting that book that is theirs to keep … makes them want to read that book in their hand instead of going to technology.”
Edwards said the vending machine arrives as reading momentum is already building at the school. Administrators have seen an uptick in the number of library books checked out to upper elementary students in the last year.
“It hasn’t had a decrease. We’ve continued to see a rise in the amount of students getting books and the types of books they’re getting,” Edwards said. “I think this book vending machine gives them another opportunity to see a book that they might not see in a library, but a book they’re going to want to read.”
Along with encouraging literacy, SDI representative Austin Welch hopes the machine fosters a sense of kindness and responsibility among students.
“The reward system is special to them for doing good things,” he said. The kids have (to do) an act of kindness (that) encourages good behavior in the school and doing something for others, not just for themselves.”
Partnerships with industry such as SDI and Atmos, Edwards said, strengthen the school’s connection with the community. He noted industry employees often have a student within the local schools or maybe even attended themselves.
“So having them reinvest in this building has been an incredible thing to see because now … they’re not investing for just their kid. They’re investing for other students,” he said. “They’re investing for their future employment base. … These are kids that are going to be active members in the community.”
Edwards said he hopes students see the effort as an encouragement to pursue their own ideas that could make New Hope Upper Elementary a better place.
“If there’s something that they want to do and if there’s something that they believe is a good thing for our building, keep asking questions. Find a way to make something possible for us,” he said. “They have every opportunity … to make this building successful. If there (are) things that they want, if there’s something that they feel is important for our building to elevate it, then we want to see what it looks like. We want them to ask questions.”
McRae is a general assignment and education reporter for The Dispatch.
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