School News

Nebo School District Teams Up with Beehive Library Consortium to Modernize Reading and Literacy Through Ebooks and E-audiobooks

Shared goal to promote digital learning in the community

In this mobile age, technology has become increasingly valuable in supporting new generations of lifelong learners and readers. Now, Nebo School District and Beehive Library Consortium have formed an innovative new partnership to increase access to more ebooks and e-audiobooks for students. This unique collaboration strives to promote literacy and digital learning by combining the schools’ and the library’s digital reading resources in one app. As a result, students can learn anytime, anywhere because of the convenience, ease of reading on-the-go and the inherent popularity of technology.

The school-library partnership provides safe access to thousands of age-appropriate titles for students’ use inside the classroom, at home and anywhere 24/7. Through Sora(link is external), the new student reading app for Nebo School District, students can now borrow the school’s collection of classroom and pleasure reading, and also access Beehive Library Consortium’s juvenile and young adult digital collection. In addition, Sora supports teachers by offering education-specific tools like achievements, exportable notes, and reading progress that encourage individualized learning.

"We are thrilled to partner with Payson City Library,” said Lana Hiskey, Communications Community Relations Coordinator at Nebo School District. “This partnership enables our Nebo students to have greater ebook and audiobook access for learning!"

The Sora app was named one of TIME’s Best Inventions 2019(link is external) and is available for Nebo School District students to download through the Apple App Store and Google Play Store, and on Chromebooks that support the Google Play Store. It is also available for use in web browsers at https://soraapp.com(link is external) on any computer.

Utah residents can also borrow and read Beehive Library Consortium’s complete ebook and e-audiobook collection with a valid library card through the award-winning Libby app(link is external). The library’s tailored collection offers ebooks, e-audiobooks and magazines including bestsellers and new releases. Readers of all ages can select from virtually every subject ranging from mystery, romance, children’s, business and more. Libby can be used on any major device or computer, including Apple (R), Android™, Chromebook™ and Kindle(R) (US only).

Both reading apps are built by OverDrive and OverDrive Education. To learn more, visit https://meet.soraapp.com/(link is external) and https://meet.libbyapp.com/(link is external).

About Nebo School District

Nebo School District is nationally acclaimed for successes in academics, operations and extracurricular activities. Nebo is recognized on the state and national level for quality programs and innovative concepts that focus on students.

With approximately 4,500 employees, Nebo School District is the sixth-largest employer in Utah County. Nebo continues to build on its mission: “We engage, empower, and collaborate to ensure student success.” Nebo School District focuses on preparing all students to succeed in school and life and prepares students for active participation in school and the global community. Nebo empowers students to acquire and develop knowledge, skills and talents and works to promote safety, involvement and student achievement.

Nebo students are consistently represented in lists of state and national honors in fine arts, academics, career, technology and athletic competitions. Nebo students consistently score above state and national norms on beginning and end-of-level assessments.

Nebo’s graduation rate is 92 percent, significantly higher than the state average of 87 percent and the national average of 80 percent. Nebo students receive over $19 million in scholarships yearly. Nebo District belongs to the Utah Valley University K-16 Alliance and is a member of the Brigham Young University Public School Partnership.

This is just a reminder that school picture day will be on Tuesday, September 22nd.  Your student should have brought home a flyer.  You can pay online at mylifetouch.com  ID# EVT98KW9C or send the money with your student that day in the Lifetouch envelope.  Please call the office with any questions.