Across New York state, there has been a growing need for more varied, interesting and inclusive student reading materials in languages other than English (LOTE). After a year of building partnerships with 24 other NY BOCES and Big 5 school districts, BOCES 2 School Library Systems (SLS) has led the way to a solution, with the launch of a new NY Reads LOTE Collection in Sora. Students K-12 and their teachers in participating districts now have 24/7 access to more than 1,500 popular titles in 20 languages. 

Readers at the elementary or secondary levels can find high interest series, like Harry Potter, Wings of Fire, Wimpy Kid, and Dog Man in languages ranging from Albanian, Arabic and Chinese to Russian, Spanish and Ukrainian. Teachers can offer a selection of titles used in required NYS curricula to their LOTE learners. Each title includes all the familiar Sora accessibility features, like Text Appearance, Pronunciation, Read to Me, and Definitions.

“Within the first two weeks, we’ve already seen 57 check outs in our districts alone,” said SLS Coordinator Jim Belair, who was the project lead on the new initiative. “As our teachers, librarians and students become familiar with the resource, we expect usage to grow exponentially.”