Inspired by her own struggles with reading at an early age and the work of Eastside Pathways, Maya Menon, a senior at Bellevue’s International School, presented her senior project to the community on May 1 at Crossroads Community Center.
Her project included a research paper on summer reading loss, working in the classroom with elementary students on literacy, and collecting over 2,000 books from the community.
Maya also created a community library in honor of Bill Henningsgaard. “Maya demonstrated how one person can make a difference in the lives of some many kids through books and reading,” said Betsy Johnson, Eastside Pathways volunteer. The library will be housed in the Crossroads Community Center and contains books for kids of all ages to read.
Maya partnered with teachers from the Bellevue School District, the City of Bellevue, YouthLink, and Eastside Pathways to make the library and book drive a big success. Maya will be distributing collected books to Eastside Pathways partners to support summer reading.