{"id":41155,"date":"2022-10-27T06:00:00","date_gmt":"2022-10-27T10:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thelandmark.com\/?p=41155"},"modified":"2022-10-27T06:00:00","modified_gmt":"2022-10-27T10:00:00","slug":"the-books-are-back-at-thomas-prince-school","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/2022\/10\/27\/the-books-are-back-at-thomas-prince-school\/","title":{"rendered":"The books are back at Thomas Prince School"},"content":{"rendered":"
By Kristen B. Payson <\/b>
\n Editor<\/i><\/div>\n

PRINCETON – The Thomas Prince School library reopened Monday, Oct. 17.<\/p>\n

That news may not be high on the list of world events, but it was very important to the students here and in the eyes of Principal Alfred \u201cAce\u201d Thompson, himself the son of a librarian.<\/p>\n

The school had gone without its library since 2020.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe library was a gym,\u201d explained Thompson.<\/p>\n

During COVID, the school\u2019s gymnasium became a cafeteria to accommodate social distancing. The library\u2019s book stacks were pushed back against the walls, the central space was cleared, and gym time took place there.<\/p>\n

Leftover from that time, a koosh ball is still perched in one of the library\u2019s hanging lights.<\/p>\n

On a recent Wednesday, a class of second-graders was seated on the corner reading rug, raptly listening to parent volunteer Aimee Kindorf read a story.<\/p>\n

Kindorfisoneofagroup of about 20 volunteers, led by Jessie Trowbridge, who made the transition from gym to library happen. Trowbridge is a TPS parent as well as the children\u2019s librarian at the Princeton Public Library. She sees a bright future for the library.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want there to be a strong connection between the school and the town,\u201d Trowbridge explained.<\/p>\n

She noted that Sara Gardner, former town librarian and volunteer, is an important part of that connection.<\/p>\n

\u201cHer help has been invaluable,\u201d Trowbridge said.<\/p>\n

As for the project itself, it took some time and some elbow grease.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was like a time warp,\u201d she said. \u201cThere were still St. Patrick\u2019s Day decorations up (from March 2020) when we started the project.\u201d<\/p>\n

Those decorations are gone now, replaced by balloons to mark the reopening.<\/p>\n

Trowbridge and Thompson both noted the book collection has been gone through, with removal of books no longer deemed appropriate or accurate.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt hadn\u2019t been reviewed for a long while,\u201d Thompson noted.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of new beginnings this year,\u201d he said. He himself is new to the school, though not to the principal role, having served as Boylston Elementary\u2019s principal for a number of years.<\/p>\n

He was quick to point out that reading, and reading outside the classroom, is an integral part of learning.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a high correlations between (having school) libraries and (higher) MCAS reading scores,\u201d Thompson said.<\/p>\n

Besides, he said, the kids are enthralled by the library. \u201cThese second-graders have never seen a school library before,\u201d he said. \u201cYou should have seen their faces the first day. So many smiles, and they were so excited they could take books home.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

PRINCETON – The Thomas Prince School library reopened Monday, Oct. 17.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":41164,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_gspb_post_css":"","_sitemap_exclude":false,"_sitemap_priority":"","_sitemap_frequency":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-41155","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"blocksy_meta":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41155","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41155"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41155\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41164"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41155"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41155"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/devcherryroad.com\/news2\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41155"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}