The recently remodeled Hopkinton Public Library serves as a free resource that students can access for many purposes.

David Antaki is a Hopkinton High School senior who frequents the public library.

“I go a lot during the week and on the weekend when I have time because now after they restored and redid it, it’s really nice,” Antaki said. “It’s a nice quiet place to do work. Often times when I’m at home on the weekend I’m less inclined to do work. I find it a lot easier to go out somewhere to get work done and the library is a great place to do that.”

While students benefit from the new space, teachers are also finding ways to utilize the library.

Hopkinton High School science teacher Bethany Spinks takes advantage of the public library by holding tutoring sessions there.

“I like the fact that there’s a lot of open space. And you feel comfortable there,” Spinks said. “It’s also a nice learning environment with little distractions.”

Annie Thie, Young Adult Librarian, and Jessi McCarthy, Adult Services Librarian, both staff members at Hopkinton Public Library, highlighted some other useful aspects the new library has to offer, like rentable quiet study rooms.

“Study rooms are basically now a prerequisite for every new library that’s being built,” Thie said. “People are looking for those kinds of things as well as the classroom, the events rooms upstairs. People just need more community space rather than just the traditional come in and check out a book kind of thing.”

McCarthy also commented on why there is now such a demand for these study rooms.

“One resource we offer are quiet study rooms. I see a lot of students using those,” McCarthy said. “It’s rare to find a place in the community where you don’t have to pay to use a space.”

Additionally, the public library has a local history room that is a great resource for Hopkinton’s history.

Although the public library seems like a great study area, why would a student choose it over the library within the high school?

“When you go to the library here at the high school obviously it’s a lot more people because it’s here in the high school. But also that’s just because they have studies, but I like going,” Antaki said. “Even when I have a study, I will tend to choose the public library over the high school library because it’s a lot less busy and I find it much easier to do work.”

While the public library already acts as a major help for many in the community, it will especially be useful with upcoming AP and final exam testing.

“I’ll probably go to the library to study for my exams,” Antaki said. “It’s a great workspace, it’s nice and quiet. There are study rooms so if I and a group of people want to go and study, then we can rent out a study room and have that to ourselves.”

While summer is approaching, and school will soon be out of session, this gives the library staff time to plan their Smart Program they hope to start up in September of 2018.

“There was a free program I started in January called “Smart” where I had high school students sign up to tutor middle school kids,” Thie said. “ I’m going to try it again in September right when the school year starts and see if we can get kids then because we had issues this year with kids not showing up.”