The director of a public library in upstate New York wants to rig the rules of an annual summer reading competition because the same kid keeps winning.
The kid is soon-to-be-fifth-grader Tyler Weaver, reports The Post-Star. This summer, he blew away the competition in the “Dig into Reading” event at Hudson Falls Public Library by consuming 63 books over the course of six weeks.
The voracious reader has a “Dig into Reading” dynasty that is nothing if not impressive. Since kindergarten, he has reigned as the top bookworm in the area. Over the course of five contests, he has read 373 books.
Tyler’s arch-nemesis is library director Marie Gandron.
As any “extremely proud” mother might, Tyler’s mother, Katie Weaver, informed The Post-Star about her son’s impressive accomplishments. When a reporter contacted Gandron about the feel-good story, though, Gandron said she didn’t feel very good about it at all.
The library director told The Post-Star that Tyler “hogs” the reading contest each year and needs to “step aside.”
“Other kids quit because they can’t keep up,” Gandron grumbled.
Gandron said she had planned to rewrite the rules so that other kids could have a better chance of winning. Her clever plan was to remove the competitive aspect of the competition, she said. Instead of giving a prize to the kid who reads the most books, the library boss would pull names from a hat.
That scheme has somehow been foiled now, though, she said, because Katie called the local newspaper.
The Daily Caller is not making any of this up.
Gandron also explained that the competition had been marred by cheating in the past, when a little girl — with her mother’s backing — falsely swore she read over 200 books. A sort of pop-quiz system is now in place to prevent a repeat of such cheating.
Tyler has never faced cheating accusations.
In previous years, his prizes have included an atlas, a t-shirt and a water bottle. There have also been certificates of achievement, suitable for framing.
“They’re really not any grand things,” Katie Weaver told The Post-Star. “I think he just likes to be the top reader.”
“Tyler just loves to read,” she added. “Everybody he tells, he gets high-fives. Everybody’s so proud of him.”
As for Tyler, he is pretty happy about his years-long feat.
“I think that was actually a record-breaking streak,” he said.
He also called Gandron’s new scheme to pick a competition winner randomly unjust.
“She might only read one slip and then (that child) would be picked out. He didn’t put enough effort in and he won. It’s not fair,” the boy argued. “How would it even be a contest if you just picked a name out of a hat?”
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