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Jean Duncan McFarren
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330.458.2706

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715 Market Ave. N, Canton, OH 44702 - 330.452.0665

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CONTACT: Jean McFarren, Deputy Director, Phone: 330.458.2706; email: jmcfarren@starklibrary.org

Stark County District Library staff member receives Rising Star Award from Northeast Ohio Regional Library System

May 7, 2015 (Canton, OH) – Corrinne Howell, SPARK Parent Partner with Stark County District Library, received the Rising Star Award from Northeast Ohio Regional Library System (NEO).

Howell was recognized with the award on Thursday, April 23, 2015 at NEO’s 2015 Spring Showcase. Representatives from libraries throughout Northeastern Ohio attended the event, including Howell. The Rising Star Award is given to one individual in the region each year who has had fewer than five years experience in libraries while having made a marked impact in that short period of time.

Corrinne Howell is a SPARK Parent Partner in the Sandy Valley area in conjunction with Stark County District Library’s Sandy Valley branch. SPARK stands for Supporting Partnership to Assure Ready Kids and is a family focused intervention program.

SPARK Parent Partners work with families and pre-kindergarten age children over the course of the school year, often times in the family’s own home, in order to prepare children for pre-school and kindergarten. Parent Partners increase early literacy skills and make a great impact on the success of children as they enter pre-school and kindergarten. Long term studies also show that when SPARK students reach the fifth grade they continue to demonstrate better performance than their peers who did not participate in SPARK.

Stark County District Library has had an increasingly important relationship with SPARK due to the natural fit with the library’s mission of increasing early literacy skills. At this time SPARK Parent Partners, who primarily work in the field in children’s homes, have their home-base at the Main Library in downtown Canton. 

Howell was nominated by Executive Director Tena Wilson for her work as a SPARK Parent Partner based on the incredible impact that she has made on the hundreds of families that she has helped since 2013. By working with families over the course of an entire school year Howell and other Parent Partners are able to eliminate the barriers to school readiness that many families face. Howell has repeatedly gone above and beyond for the families that she has worked with and is seen as a leader and role model to other Parent Partners and library staff. “Passion, dedication and excitement radiates off of Corrinne Howell,” says Wilson. The Rising Star Award is a high honor and Howell is a deserving recipient

About the Library:

The Stark County District Library is a winner of the National Medal for library service, is one of the best 100 libraries in the U.S. according to the HAPLR rating, and is a Library Journal 5 Star library. Its Main Library, nine Branch Libraries, and two Bookmobiles and two Kidmobiles serve 150,000 library card holders. More than 1.4 million people visit the Stark County District Library each year, holdings number 884,000 items, and annual circulation is 3.6 million items. The collection includes books, audio visual materials, and periodicals for all ages. In addition, the Library provides programs and classes for adults, teens, and children, computer and Internet access, a downloadable collection of books and music, genealogy services, traveling collections on Bookmobiles and Kidmobiles, as well as outreach services to shut-ins, nursing homes, and housing units. It is one of the nine largest library systems in the state of Ohio, serving 12 local school districts. For more information, call 330-452-0665 or visit http://www.thesmartstore.org. For more information on SPARK, visit www.sparkohio.org.

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