Our new Connect Your Summer program reinvented the Canton Public Library's traditional summer reading program. Connect Your Summer simplified and streamlined participation by creating one program for all ages that could be completed singly or as a group, team, or family. While we continue to offer a paper-based format, Connect Your Summer was primarily designed to be completed online—so you could complete your log at anytime, from anywhere—and allowed library staff to provide more meaningful interactions with you through our increased programming and events. Badges could be earned by reading as well as other means. Our overarching mission is "Connecting Your Community," and Connect Your Summer focused on community partners, community events, and shared experiences, with the library serving as the hub.

Because Connect Your Summer is a new approach to summer library programming, we are asking you to provide feedback to help us learn from and improve it:

• If you participated in Connect Your Summer, Share your feedback
• If you did not participate, Share your feedback

Thank you in advance for sharing your thoughts with us!

Sincerely,

Eva Davis, Director

Congratulations to Garden City residents, and to all Garden City Public Library cardholders, on the July 18 reopening of the Garden City Public Library.

The Garden City Public Library has announced that they will be open for thirty hours, five days per week, from July 18 through at least the November millage election. Unfortunately, these hours will not meet the minimum requirements for state certification. As a result, the Canton Public Library will not resume reciprocity with Garden City Public Library at this time.

Welcome to Connect Your Summer 2011, our new Summer program that encourages you to connect to the Canton community through reading and activities.

Connect Your Summer is truly a community-wide program. Like our logo, the library is the hub of Connect Your Summer, with spokes leading out to our partners: the Friends of the Library, Canton Leisure Services, the Canton Downtown Development Authority, the Canton Chamber of Commerce, the Cherry Hill Village Theater, the Michigan Philharmonic, and others.

Sign in to your individual, family, pair, or group account to start earning virtual badges for reading, attending community events, attending library programs, attending programs put on by one of our partners, visiting places in our community, using the library, or for activities you come up with on your own. As you complete activities, click 'Claim' next to the appropriate badge to get that badge. Publish your earned badges and write reviews of your activities to share your experiences with other Connect Your Summer participants.

Connect Your Summer is designed to be completed online, at your own pace, when it is convenient for you. Want to mark your badge completed at 10:30 at night? No problem! Do you find it tough to keep track of reading logs for every member of your family? There are no more paper logs to keep track of (or lose!). Have you wished you could take a solitary activity and make it a group event? Now you can — create a new account to register for Connect Your Summer as a group, and because it's one program designed for all ages, you can earn your badges together.

I am proud of the work my staff has done to create this innovative new program that turns the traditional library Summer program on its head and allows for multiple ways to participate, at a level that you can tailor to meet your needs. Our overarching goal with Connect Your Summer is to encourage you to make connections within your community. I think that you, your family, and your friends will enjoy the variety of ways you can use Connect Your Summer to learn more about your neighbors and the entire Canton community.

Best,

Eva M. Davis, Director