KV Students Donate Books to Horsham School

The library structure itself may be unusable, but that does not mean book-borrowing is over for the 85 students at the Montessori Children's House in Horsham. 

Following a fire in August, the school, which educates kids from 18 months to age 6, was left with the charred remains of its library, which had housed 2,000 books.

But, in the weeks since, an overwhelming outpouring of support from the community - including Keith Valley Middle School's month-long book drive which netted 1,600 books - has doubled the number of books available for children to check out, Principal Nona Melnick told Patch. 

"The community has been unbelievable," Melnick said. "People have just opened their hearts."

On Wednesday morning, Keith Valley students walked down the hill alongside two men driving a cart chock full of boxes and bags of books and watched as the men loaded the haul into outdoor storage bins. 

From there, Melnick said a grandmother of one of the Montessori students will clean the books, insert check-out pockets in the back and ready them for student borrowing. 

Library borrowing resumed earlier this month at the school, Melnick said, adding that the circumstances aren't really of concern to the youngsters. 

"They know they're having library still and that's important to them," she said. 

Keith Valley Middle School librarian Lisa Quinn, whose son is an alum of Montessori Children's House, said helping out was a no-brainer. 

"They're a neighbor to us," Quinn said, adding that the local connection was "definitely that pull" to encourage greater participation. 

For now, library books at Montessori Children's House are arranged on a donated blue cart which sits in the school's hallway. Kids can peruse and check out books there with the help of parent volunteers. 

As far as once again having a physical library room, Melnick said bids will be sought to repair that once the school's roof - also damaged in the fire - is fixed.

In the meantime, the books themselves are library enough.