Voc. Ed. Carpentry students Isaac McConkey (LRHS), Oliver York, Troy Swift, and Connor Keisman (Molly Ockett School) taking a well-deserved bow with teacher Chaz Reed for their work in building Little Free Libraries.

BRIDGTON — Charles (Chaz) Reed, a carpentry teacher at the Vocational Education (Voc Ed) program of Lakes Region High School, is having his classes build four Little Free Libraries for the Bridgton-Lake Region Rotary Club. The libraries are small weather-proof bookcases that will be placed in neighborhoods to enable people to share books 24/7.

Each little library will be a chartered Little Free Library in a worldwide network of libraries, and each one will appear on a world map. The goal is to make books available to people who have difficulty coming to a town library and to help foster a love of reading in children and teens. The books do not have to be returned; most Little Free Libraries have an equal number of people contributing and taking books.

The Little Free Libraries have been built at minimal cost, thanks to the ingenuity of the Voc Ed students’ use of scrap materials and the generosity of Ace Hardware by Hayes, who donated the paint to match Rotary’s blue and gold theme colors. Many students participated in this project. The students in the photo are the most recent group. All of them have taken great pride in the project, as they should. They have done a very professional job under the guidance of Chaz Reed.

The Bridgton-Lake Region Rotary Club is very grateful for the enthusiastic support of LRHS and the Lake Region community in making good books more accessible to everyone. The Little Free Libraries will be placed in Denmark, Sweden, and Waterford. A location for the fourth library has not yet been determined. For more information, please contact Rotarian Joanne Cohn at 617-306-1956.

For more information about Bridgton-Lake Region Rotary Club and other projects in the community, check out its website: https://lakeregionrotary.com or its Facebook Page.