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Celebrating Reading: Big Accomplishments for our Most Avid Readers

Overcoming all the obstacles that come with a pandemic, nearly 30 St. Michael’s College School (SMCS) students participated in the school’s annual reading challenge, logging a combined total of almost 37 million words.

Health protocols imposed to keep everyone safe from COVID-19 restricted Odette Library access to specific cohorts which meant selecting books and taking quizzes all had to be handled remotely. But that didn’t stop this group of committed students from participating in the SMCS Reading Olympics.

SMCS Reading Olympics zoom meeting

To help generate a little more excitement, a senior category was added this year for the first time. Second and third place prizes were included to create more interest. As a result, this year’s competition was intense. Readers took to Zoom with Odette library staff members, Margarita Lopez and Anita Zawadzki, to complete quizzes during lunch and after school.

The Odette Library congratulates all students who continued reading after completing the Accelerated Reader Program (ARP) requirements for their English class in order to qualify as participants in the 2020-21 Reading Olympics.

“The whole Odette Library team is so proud of these boys for this accomplishment,” says Zawadzki, a library technician at SMCS. “We are just sad that we weren’t able to celebrate with the annual pizza party this year. But Olympians and all avid readers at SMCS should stay tuned for some exciting new Reading Olympics events planned for the fall.”

SMCS Odette Library

Here are the statistics from this year’s competition:

Together – while apart – 28 students read 411 books for a total of 36,656,436 words.

The Top Readers for 2021 are: Stefan Lukowski in Grade 7, Shiyu Zhang in Grade 8, and Ignacio Corral in Grade 10. Our Senior Top Reader is Christopher Notarandrea in Grade 11.

The Top Reader in each grade will see his name engraved on the Reading Olympics plaque – mounted on the wall inside the library double doors – and will receive a certificate acknowledging his reading accomplishment at the school's Academic Awards ceremony in the fall. Each of these students also receives a $250 cash award to celebrate their reading achievement.

Congratulations to our second and third place readers: Henry deBlois, Julian Long, Harry Lu, Maddox Ganesh, Tobias Weiler, Matthew Fortier, Matthew Redmond, Noah Bertola and Adam Zanin. They also will receive a certificate recognizing their accomplishment. Second place winners receive a $100 prize and third place is awarded $75.

Congratulations to all our qualifiers: Luke Rebello, Harris Kim, Leo Zhou, Giacomo Amantea, Jeffrey McLean, Thomas Rebello, Kieran Cline, Jacob Devine, Theo Gingras, Daniel Bada, Thomas Murray, Lucas Francescucci, Allen Wang, Leo Kim. Each will receive an Indigo gift card.

Please check the Odette Library website for all Reading Olympics news.

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