Leader Editorial: A generous gift of books will enrich students

Word of a gracious gift made the rounds this week and we wanted to chime in with our own appreciation for the donation of 1,000 books former Luther Burbank Middle School teacher Rebecca Mieliwocki made to the campus.

As the story unfolds, the 2012 National Teacher of the Year, who now works on assignment at Burbank Unified, recently did some work for Scholastic Corporation, a publishing house that’s well-known among teachers and parents for its many offerings appealing to the younger set. After Mieliwocki completed her consulting work there, the company asked which school she’d like to see receive the book donation, valued at $5,000. She’d begun teaching in 2002 at Luther Burbank, so it was a natural choice for her and allowed her to leave a “legacy” there, as she told us. Her gift resulted in the addition of 25-30 books to each teacher’s classroom shelves.

Digital reading via e-books is here to stay, there’s no question about it. And there are solid reasons to embrace it, portability and relatively low costs among them. But there is something about holding a book in one’s hand that can enrich the experience. Experts say that when we’re reading online, we tend to skim over text rather than study passages. Our reading comprehension might also suffer because we face distractions from other Internet offerings. So, when we can place paper books into the hands of children we’re giving them a tried-and-true learning experience.

We encourage the lucky students at Luther Burbank Middle School to dig into the pages of those new books — and savor every moment spent with them.