Staff file photo Lorena Stearns, who has served as the Hubbard Public Library’s director since November 2013, will receive a certificate of recognition from the Ohio School Boards Association for all the library does to collaborate with the Hubbard City Schools.

HUBBARD — A longtime library director will be recognized for her efforts in the community and school district at an upcoming meeting.

Lorena Stearns, who has served as the Hubbard Public Library’s director since November 2013, will receive a certificate of recognition from the Ohio School Boards Association. She’ll accept it at Monday’s Hubbard Board of Education meeting, according to a news release from Hubbard Friends of the Library, a non-profit supporting the library and its programs and activities..

She’ll be one of several recognized in a group that includes other library supporters.

In a letter informing her of the honor, Superintendent Raymond Soloman noted Stearns to be a “strong supporter and valuable contributor” to the district, adding that the board wanted to express their sincere appreciation for all Stearns does for the community’s children.

Stearns said Thursday the letter came as a total surprise, adding it was humbling and “true collaboration.”

“It’s humbling in the aspect of, ‘yes, I’m the leader of the library organization,’ but so much of what my staff does and what we collaborate with the school for, and in many aspects, is to help the community,” Stearns said. “It’s to help our kiddos; it’s the heart of true collaboration, and to be honored for that is a wonderful thing for the library to be recognized as an organization in the community that is here for everybody.”

Stearns listed some of the things the library provides for youth, such as a toy lending library, a sensory garden — that librarians had just finished planting that morning — and a virtual reality kit, which gets loaned out to teachers to bring their students new experiences.

“Everything from dissecting a frog to things that they can’t necessarily do hands-on or might not have at home, the opportunity or even within the school, might not have the opportunity,” Stearns said. “But yet they can experience it that way. And that kit we’ve put together was again a collaboration of the school supporting us, writing a letter of support for the grant we applied for.”

Stearns said the library reached out to teachers in the district to find out what they were looking for and what could help them.

Stearns said they were “extremely fortunate” to have that connection between the district and the community. She noted that she and Soloman were new to their respective positions around the same time, which helped forge the strong relationship the library has.