What do students say?

After last week's NY Times story about whether or not schools need books in their libraries, the paper has followed up with comments from students. As would be expected, opinions among these many high school students and, it appears, graduates vary considerably. Several support the thoughts of the librarians and teachers interviewed earlier who defended the importance of reading books because of the pleasant physical experience. Clearly this aspect of reading is still important to many people of all ages, although there are others who find reading electronic materials equally enjoyable. Most of the students make a distinction between reading for research and homework and reading for pleasure. I think is an important point that many commentators ignore. The format for reading should suit the purpose of reading. My prediction would be that even as more and more material goes online because of the ease of searching, ease of transportation, and value of preservation, books will continue to exist as a viable form offering sufficient value to make them important to many people.