Photo provided St. Mary’s Central School librarian Rena Koontz reads to students in the school’s library.

ST. CLAIRSVILLE — St. Mary’s Central School will receive $5,000 from the Laura Bush Foundation for America’s Libraries.

The foundation awarded more than $1 million in library grants this year, with St. Mary’s being one of 220 schools from 38 states.

The Laura Bush Foundation for America’s Libraries supports school libraries with the greatest needs, with the goal of encouraging all students to develop a love of reading and learning. Since its inception in 2002, it has awarded $24 million to more than 4,200 schools across the country.

Principal Angel Glitch said Finance Director Karen Gress has volunteers in the parish who help search for possible grants and found the Laura Bush Foundation grant and immediately applied for it.

The funds are only allowed to be spent on books, audiobooks and magazines.

“The grant can’t be used for furniture and or anything to go in the library, it has to only be used for books,” Glitch said.

She added that the school’s librarian, Rena Koontz, spent the end of the school year speaking with students about what books and magazines they would be interested in having purchased through the grant.

“We got notice that we probably were going to get it a while ago, so she’s been looking around and interviewing the kids and seeing what kind of new books they would like to have. And she’s got a bunch already picked out, so we’ll be ready to go once the check arrives.”

The foundation said the grant was created for the libraries awarded to update and diversify their collections.

“Libraries help open doors far beyond the classroom, giving children the resources they need to dream, explore and be bold,” Bush said in a press release. “When we support school libraries, we are encouraging students to be strong readers and lifelong learners.”

During the annual Laura Bush Book Club event, which is part of the Engage at the Bush Center series presented by NexPoint, she revealed her 2026 summer reading list.

The list features 17 books, all falling into one of three themes: “Freedom to Be Bold,” “Freedom to Dream” and “Freedom to Explore.” The annual collection includes recommendations for young readers through middle schoolers.

“This year’s summer reading list celebrates America’s 250th birthday with themes for children of all ages. I hope parents and grandparents will cherish the time spent reading these titles together as a family. Summer is the perfect season to slow down, snuggle up with a good book and rediscover the joy of reading,” Bush added.

In addition to updating the library’s catalog, the school is in the midst of a large renovation project. Last summer, the school replaced its windows. This summer, the focus will be on installing a new electrical system, HVAC for air conditioning and heating, and upgraded Wi-Fi.

“This place looks completely different, they’ve actually taken out all of the ceilings in our main building — every single classroom, every single hallway, offices, everything,” Glitch said. “Hopefully we’ll be done by the time school starts, they tell me it will be. So when the kids come back to school we’ll have air conditioning, which everybody’s looking forward to.”

She added that because the school is an older building, teachers are usually only able to plug one or two things in at a time without blowing a fuse.

“Nothing has been done since 1958 when the school was built. So we’re looking forward to being able to use everything that we need to and plug things in and everything actually working,” Glitch said.

The project currently has a fundraising goal of $3 million.

“In the first three-year phase of the campaign, which is still ongoing, we received $1,325,000 from private donations from parishioners, school families and local businesses, who pledged a total of $1,469,000. In addition, we received $58,500 from foundation grants,” St. Mary’s Central business manager Karen Gress previously said. “We have now started the second three-year phase of the campaign to raise the remaining $1.5 million.”

Glitch added there is not a definitive date for when the school will receive the check, but she was told by the foundation that it should arrive any day now.