The Delray Beach Public Library and the School District of Palm Beach County are providing free lunches for students age 18 and younger through Friday, July 28. Free lunch is available from from 11 a.m. to noon and snacks from 2 to 4 p.m. weekdays. No registration is required, and holidays and weekends are not included. Adults accompanying children can eat for $3.
“We hope the children of the community will come feed their bellies and feed their minds, Karen Ronald, the library’s executive director, said in a news release. “Our doors are always open and our focus is always the kids; we’ll be offering activities during the lunch hours including story times, games, and craft projects. Plus, we will be giving away free books on a weekly basis that they can take home.”
Provided through a grant from Jarden Consumer Solutions of Boca Raton, the library’s 7,000 Free Books program encourages students to read over summer break in order to maintain their reading levels. In addition to the library, the books are used at more than 150 summer outreach programs to camps, schools and community centers provided by the Children’s Department.
“The children are so excited, when we come in to read, and we give them the free books,” Ilene Glickman, head of the library’s Children’s Department, said in a news release. “I love this program; they are so absorbed in their new books. Some of the children have never owned a book before, and they ask, ‘Do I really get to keep this?’ It’s these moments when you know you have just instilled a lifelong love of reading.”
