When I was a much younger man, summer for me meant at least one trip to Glace Bay to spend a few days visiting with my grandmother Grant and a various assortment of aunts and uncles. As the vast majority of my first cousins on that particular side of the family were much older than me, these trips, if I am being honest, were often more endured than they were enjoyed.
However, the one bright light in an otherwise dull experience was that the bustling metropolis of Glace Bay had one thing that the bustling metropolis of Grande Anse could not boast: A public library. So while other elements of my annual summer vacation involved endless hours traipsing through the forests and streams of rural Cape Breton, these short jaunts to Gram’s place involved, for the most part, endless hours of traipsing through the pages of as many books as the local librarian would allow me to check out.
Libraries here in Nova Scotia have become a bit of a news item of late, mostly due to the fact that they are being widely defunded by various levels of government. Halifax Regional Municipal Council recently caused a bit of a stir when they decided to tie the hands of the Halifax Regional Centre for Education (HRCE) when it came to spending money supplied through supplementary funding. Those monies, which have been supplied to HRCE for decades, became a point of contention when it was discovered that the education entity had been using them to payroll librarians (more appropriately, Librarian Support Specialists) in schools. In May, council decided that the funding for librarians would be phased out over the next five years, leaving the question of who would staff school libraries after that point unanswered.
The future of libraries at the various Nova Scotia Community College campuses that dot our provinces landscape also made headlines, although their future did not suffer from similar uncertainty. In a rather terse announcement, also released in May, the NSCC stated in no uncertain terms that it was facing major financial pressures due in part to a reduction in government funding. Determined to “focus on what was essential”, the college laid off 45 employees, among them, 11 full time librarians.
According to union sources, the position of librarian is often misunderstood, involving everything from teaching students about academic integrity to how to identify misinformation to the benefits and pitfalls of AI. Having the governing body of one of our provinces most important higher education entities declare openly that this work is unessential should at least raise a collective provincial eyebrow, if not provincial ire.
Then, of course, there was the recent kerfuffle caused in the Annapolis Valley when it was reported that five of that area’s 11 library branches would be closed, once again, due to funding constraints. According to the Annapolis Valley Regional Library board CEO, Julia Merritt, the Houston government’s recent decision to not increase funding for libraries left the group little choice. In an interview on the matter, Merritt stated that the board needed to maintain fiscal responsibility, and that the closures were an attempt to “stabilize the system and preserve essential library services at the branches it can afford to operate.”
When it comes to schools and their purpose for existing, teaching kids to read is a fairly fundamental piece of any definition. The massive amount of time, energy and resources spent on that particular endeavour far outstrips any other in schools with the exception of perhaps numeracy. Indeed, the battle over how to best teach kids to read has spilled over from the classroom to the courtroom, and there have been several instances both here in Canada and south of the border where school districts have been sued because children did not learn this most basic of skills.
It is also of note that reading is currently experiencing a bit of a renaissance among young people. According to a recent report out of the UK, the number of children aged 8 to 18 who are reading for enjoyment has risen for the first time in five years. Research conducted by an organization called the National Literacy Trust showed that the numbers of children surveyed who enjoyed reading went from 32.7% in 2025 to 36.1% in 2026. Although the number had plummeted from a high of 51.5% in 2021, the fact that there was an increase this year was a cause for hope, according to Britain’s Education Secretary, Bridget Phillipson.
“When reading feels relevant and role models get involved,” she told the BBC, “children develop a passion with benefits that go far beyond the classroom”.
These few percentage points to the positive may not seem like a reason to celebrate, but kids enjoyment of reading has been on the decline for a number of years now, in particular among boys, who, in general, are not as likely to do well in school as girls. Considering the economic and social stakes, this learning gap should be something that is of major concern to politicians and policy makers alike.
In the name of full disclosure, I wasn’t a great student in school, and somewhat ashamedly, those trips to Glace Bay were far from my favourite part of summer vacation. I was, however, a voracious reader, and being tucked away in a corner of Gram’s sitting room, vaguely registering the novelty of traffic going by on Reserve street as I turned the pages of some adventure novel, remains a fond memory for me.
As such, I am at a loss as to how we can quietly sit by as a province and watch as, one after another, our libraries turn their lights out for good.
If we truly value education in this province, if we want our students and our population to prosper, literacy cannot be the sole responsibility of the classroom teacher. Yes, schools can teach the vast majority of kids to read. However, without a place to access books, or, indeed, a place to read them, efforts to improve literacy rates and the love of reading will fall short.
This summer, as you and your family do your own version of traipsing, take a moment to drop by your local library with your kids. You never know; your child discovering a love of reading may only be one librarian-suggested book away.
frostededucation 