Summer Reading 2025!

By Drew Cooper, Youth Services Librarian

The Chickasha Public Library’s 2025 Summer Reading program, “Color Our World,” is officially over. We had over 400 youth ages 0 to 17 registered and participating in our Summer Reading challenge, over 100 more than last year. That’s a lot of youth reading. Families traveled from 8 different counties to participate in our programs (Grady, Caddo, Stephens, Canadian, Garvin, McClain, Commanche and even Cleveland County). That is fantastic! 
 
Our youth participated in more than 50 weekly programs and most completed all 3 Summer Reading challenges (Color Our World, Yeehaw, and Shark Week). They set personal and family goals, and we also set a Library goal for all of them to reach. Our goal this year was to read at least 200,000 minutes combined, and our youth more than tripled that goal. We ended the summer with more than 628,000 combined minutes read by youth only. That’s more than 10,467 hours or 62 solid weeks of reading in only two months! Wowsers, that’s a lot of reading! I am more than proud of our families, and especially our kiddos and teens.  
 
Even more amazing was the number of youth completions for 2025. We had around 98% completion. That’s fantastic! Here’s a little food for thought: Considering the total number of people in Grady County, and the number of youth who participated in and completed our 2025 Summer Reading program, we more than doubled the percentage of completions when compared with the number of participants in all the libraries in OKC combined.  I am so proud of our community, our families, and our youth. Can’t wait for next summer when we will “Unearth a Story” together! Get ready to “dig” up some good books.