Whatcom librarians to appear Friday on ‘Today’ to highlight this community effort
A pair of Whatcom County elementary school librarians will appear Friday morning on NBC’s “Today” show to highlight the community efforts to help rebuild a library ruined by last fall’s flooding of the Nooksack River.
Sumas Elementary librarian Kathy Bronkema and Bernice Vossbeck Elementary librarian Jennifer Frombly were in New York earlier this week for a taping of the segment, which will air at about 10:20 a.m. Friday, June 10, on NBC, according to Facebook posts by the Nooksack Valley School District and Lynden School District.
The segment will “highlight the ‘waves of kindness’ that the Whatcom County community shared with the students of Sumas Elementary following the flooding,” according to the Nooksack Valley post made Wednesday, June 8.
Frombly also will be a part of the segment, according the Lynden post made Thursday, June 9, after she spearheaded a scholastic book donation at Bernice Vossbeck in Lynden that helped benefit Sumas Elementary.
The book fair, which was held in November, was Frombly’s first at Bernice Vossbeck Elementary, according to a Lynden School District release in December, and it generated approximately $9,500 in sales, which returned about 50% back in Scholastic Dollars for the schools to purchase more books.
Frombly thought it would be right to use the fair’s success to donate to nearby Sumas Elementary to help that school rebuild after it lost its library to floodwaters.
“I have been looking for tangible ways to help the families affected by the floods,” Frombly said in the release. “By donating Scholastic Dollars, the librarian there will be able to order what is needed, when it is needed.”
The Nooksack Valley School District is preparing to open a new elementary school building in Sumas in the fall of 2022, and it will have a new principal at the same time in Sarah Condreay, according to a May 18 release.
The community will begin to move into the new building this spring, according to the release, with the fifth grade “moving on ceremony” scheduled to be held in the new Sumas Elementary. The entire school body will be at the new building for that “first big event in the new space, a celebration for the entire Sumas community,” the release states.
