Blog, Press, and News!

By the time a North Carolina toddler turns 2, there’s a 40% chance they already have their own tablet. A 2025 report from Common Sense Media found that screen time at home for young children now averages about two and a half hours a day, and a growing share of it is spent on short-form video — TikTok, YouTube Shorts, the kind of clips built to be watched once and swiped past. It’s a snapshot of what childhood looks like right now, nationally.

We’re only 23 days away from the best event of the summer – Book Harvest’s annual Summer Block Party!

This week, thanks to the generous sponsorship of Replacements, Ltd., I attended my first Books on Break program at Rankin Elementary School in Guilford County, and I've been thinking about it ever since.

Reading Outside the Lines: Book Harvest's StoryWalk at Heritage, A Gathering Place What if a walk through the woods could also be a story? That's exactly what visitors to Heritage, A Gathering Place in Roxboro will find when they head out on the new trail behind the building. Thanks to a partnership between Book Harvest and the JES Avanti Foundation, a StoryWalk now winds along a 0.25 mile stretch of wooded trail behind Heritage, inviting families to read together as they mov

As Book Harvest grows, our incredible staff does, too! We are so excited to have welcomed multiple full-time staff members at Book Harvest since the beginning of the year, and we wanted to take a moment to highlight several of the unique stories, experiences, and passions that brought them together in Book Harvest’s pursuit of literacy and justice for all.

At some point during the day, a child picked up a book -- the one millionth book provided through Books on Break -- and carried it home.

There's something quietly extraordinary about a room full of families celebrating a child's very first graduation. Tiny caps and gowns. Five years of books, home visits, bedtime stories, and growth — all leading to this moment.

On the morning of May 15, 2026, something remarkable happened at Wilton Elementary School in Franklinton, North Carolina: a child picked up a book — the millionth book harvested during our Books on Break program.