 we're about ready to get started. So first of all, I'd like to explain a very warm welcome to all of you. Good morning. Thank you for being here for the launch or kickoff of the 2019 Mayor's Summer Reading Club. So we're excited to be announcing that we have started the Summer Reading Program. This is a very important program for the city and we are very fortunate that Mayor Nuremberg is the champion of this program. Unfortunately, he was not available today to be here with us to share some remarks. But he believes as we do that reading during the summer is very important for students to continue to read. Studies have shown that the students do not continue to read during the summer. They fall back into reading skills and so it's important to have programs and initiatives that encourage students to continue to read during the summer and the library's Mayor's Summer Reading Program does that. Later we will have members of the Library Leadership Team that will tell you about the theme and some of the things that we do to encourage children to participate. But before we go to that part of the program, I'd like to recognize some individuals that are here with us today. I'll start with members of the Library Board of Trustees. We have in front of us here Linda Nair who is the Vice Chair and represents District 10. Marcy Yens who represents District 9 and we have Josie Martin who represents District 3. Thank you all three of you for being here this morning. Yes, we also have some very important partners that help us be able to deliver this important program to the community. I'll start with the Friends of the San Antonio Public Library and we have the current President, Beth Graham here with us this morning. The San Antonio Public Library Foundation also provides support and resources and I believe we have Katie Kinder-DeBach. Is she here? Not yet, okay. And of course the Magic Theater is here also supporting the Mayor's Summer Reading Program. So I wanted to acknowledge those three entities who provide important support for our Summer Reading Program. So again I'm very pleased that all of you are here. We have a lot of kids. They're already engaged in conversation with our librarians. We have a lot of activities for them after the program and you'll hear more about those activities. But again I just want to express our appreciation for your continued support for those that are parents who we want to encourage you to enroll your children in the Summer Reading Program. There's also an adult component and you'll hear more about that in a few minutes. So at this time it's my pleasure to introduce members of the library leadership teams that are that really work to put this program together and to execute it. And so I'll start with the interim coordinator of children's services Prasencia Hopp who's over here to my left and Jennifer Velasquez our coordinator for team services and Dr. Haley Holmes who's the coordinator for adult services. They will be coming to the podium very shortly to explain more about the Summer Reading Program. Again thank you so much this morning and they're coming to the podium as a group so I will step to the side and let them take over. Good morning. I'm really glad to see so many children here this morning and I'd like to ask children if they would show me their hands. Can you show me your hands please? Can you show me? Thank you and let's put them like even closer. Here we go. Is that better? Okay all right so this summer we are putting books into the hands of children. We are giving them opportunities to find joy in reading and learning about the world around them. Are we okay now? Oh wow. Should I start over? Okay all right. Any child ages birth to 12 who reads any eight books that they like this summer will have a chance to choose a brand new book to keep. Why? Why are we giving them books? Well because children who get to choose what they read are more motivated to read and children who are motivated to read will read more and they'll read better. We've also heard a lot about how during the summer when children choose not to read they go back to school reading less well than they did at the end of the year and the research tells us that if they read at least six books over the summer they'll maintain their reading level. If they read 10 books over the summer they'll actually advance in their reading level. So we're saying at least eight. Eight is great but if we can do 10, 16, 20 or more even better. We're also excited to be spending the summer celebrating Apollo 11 and the Wiener Landing. This summer children will have opportunities to explore everything from aliens to moon rovers to Van Gogh but don't worry there's no trip into outer space actually involved. We'll travel via books, art and activities and we're going to have a lot of fun together along the way. We have a full schedule of special performers including the Magic Theater, Dinosaur George, Happy Tales, Sandbanks Shadow Factory, and Will Parker. So this summer your San Antonio Public Libraries are going to be sold with music and drama and animals prehistoric and live. So we thank you for joining us on that adventure. Hi everybody I'm Jennifer Velazquez and I'm coordinator of team library services at your San Antonio Public Library. That means I have the job of taking care of 13 to 18 year olds and that is what our team summer reading program is all about. You know it's the 50th anniversary of the lunar landing and it's the 20th anniversary of the team summer program so we're so proud of that and I have fantastic news on top of that and that is in the first week of the program we have already signed up over 1,000 teenagers which is amazing. So we launched and we're heading towards a metaphor that I can't finish and so we want to encourage 13 to 18 year olds to drop by their library and become a member of the summer program. If you engage in reading or attending library activities and you get to that magic number of eight we'll be happy to give you a limited edition 2019 team summer program. Sylvia is laughing at me. Team summer t-shirt. Also we know that hanging out at the library is a safe free alternative for a lot of teams. We want to encourage them to visit take advantage of our air conditioning and if many of our locations take advantage of the summer lunch program that we offer in partnership with the San Antonio food bank. So for example here at the team library on the third floor every day from Monday through Thursday from 12 30 to 1 30 if you're 18 or under drop by and get a free lunch hang out and attend programs with us. So that's the team summer program. Thank you Jennifer and Crescencia. I'm Hailey Holmes I'm the coordinator of services for adults for the library and I'd like to invite you to participate in the adult summer reading program. So I get to encourage people 19 to 99 and up to participate because the public library has something for everyone. When you sign up for adult summer reading you're going to get a card each time you read or listen to a book or attend a program you get a punch on your card when you get four punches you can pick out a free book that's been provided by the friends of the San Antonio Public Library when you get eight punches you're entered to win some grand prizes from the San Antonio Public Library Foundation and those prizes include a telescope a home planetarium some NASA messenger bags so some pretty cool prizes that you might be able to win in addition every time you get a punch you get entered to win one of these super snazzy t-shirts so we have programs for adults as well including craft programs where you can paint your own phases of the moon t-shirt and gaming we're also going to have astronomy clubs out at many of the locations and these programs are open to families as well so you can bring the whole family to see the night sky and in cooperation with the Smithsonian we're going to have a live webinar where they're going to recreate the Apollo moon landing for us in July and that'll be simulcast at many locations at the same time and I just want to finish by inviting you to our end of the summer game night that's going to be held here at the central library on August 3rd and this is only for adults we're going to have games on first and second floors from 6 to 10 p.m. including your probably first chance to play miniature golf in the library so I hope that we see you all here on August 3rd and with that we'd like to turn it back over to Romero. Wow miniature golf I'll put that on my calendar I'm going to do that I want to thank Hayley, Prasencia and Jennifer for providing amazing leadership in executing the three components of the mayor summer reading program thank you so much and thanking staff I want to acknowledge the rest of the team library team in all 30 locations throughout the library system who also provide excellent service and and help us execute this program I'd like to thank our marketing team led by Caitlin Coward for a Caitlin thank you thank you so much for organizing and there's so many other staff members that work in the front lines as well as behind the scene too many to name but I want to express my deep appreciation and gratitude for the work they do for the valuable work they do they make me look good so thank you so much and so at this time I would like to invite those that are here to participate in various activities and experiences and for you to have fun thank you again for being here this morning