Add the unique scenario of remote learning in 2020, and the need for digital access to reading materials becomes more evident. While USD 428 buildings maintain libraries of their own, inventory does not always match the demand for specific titles or genres.

This digital collection is available to students learning on-site as well as those enrolled in GB Remote Learning. Through Sora, USD 428 students now have access to a digital library of over 5,000 juvenile titles, over 3,000 young adult titles, and 742 audiobooks. In speaking with CKLS, I learned about Sora and how the program ties right in with the eBooks that CKLS has already purchased for Great Bend Public Library.” “I have always wanted to get eBooks for my students,” said Holly Tittel, Great Bend Middle School librarian, “but eBooks are so expensive and many purchases are only good for one year. To support the unique needs of all readers, Sora offers inclusive tools, including Read-Alongs, dyslexic font, adjustable text, a multilingual interface, and Google Translate.

Sora, the student reading app from OverDrive Education, gives USD 428 students the ability to borrow age-appropriate e-books and audiobooks from a digital collection available through CKLS. Read the full press release here and see the infographic here.Great Bend USD 428 and the Central Kansas Library System have formed an innovative partnership to increase access to ebooks and e-audiobooks, allowing students to learn anytime, from any device. The Gambian internet isn’t today up to letting me load the infographic from OverDrive, but it paints a vivid picture of a format that clearly has not lost its appeal, no matter how many misleading headlines the trade media may roll out quoting partial industry statistics as the whole truth and nothing but.

OverDrive reports that the school reading app Sora has clocked 100 million downloads, 87% of which were ebooks, over the four years since the app launched in September 2018. The above quote from OverDrive is one of those times. Just occasionally a humble press release manages to say it so succinctly it can’t be bettered. There’s no physical reference point that can paint an accurate picture - no quirky stat for how many times they’d wrap around the Earth lined up in a row or measure up against the world’s tallest skyscraper.” – OverDrive

“It’s difficult to quantify what 100 million books looks like - and doubly difficult when the books in question are ebooks and audiobooks.

Sora reading app