Illustrative image created for Word ’Round Town; not an actual photograph of the school or event.
WAUKEE, IOWA ~ Most vending machines ask you to choose between chips, candy or something fizzy.
This one asks a much better question:
What do you want to read?
Students in the Waukee Community School District are getting a birthday treat that doesn’t come wrapped in frosting.
They get to choose a book from a book vending machine, and keep it.
A recent school post showed students happily making their birthday selections and explained that children with summer birthdays won’t miss out either. They’ll get their turn on their half birthday.
Now that is one birthday tradition we can get behind.
The idea is part of a larger literacy effort taking shape in Waukee.
The Waukee Leadership Institute Class of 2026, working with the Waukee Community Schools Foundation, has been supporting a project called Dispensing Literacy. The goal is to place book vending machines in elementary schools, stock them with books and provide tokens students can use to make a selection.
And unlike the vending machine down the hall that might leave you wondering why your crackers got stuck on the spiral…
this machine is meant to send a child home with a story.
According to the project, students may receive tokens on their birthdays and then choose a book they get to keep. Organizers say the idea is designed to make reading feel exciting while also putting books directly into children’s hands.
The Waukee effort has included fundraising for machines, books and tokens, with the Community Schools Foundation providing matching support for the larger project.
It’s a simple idea.
A birthday.
A token.
A walk up to a vending machine.
And then the very serious childhood decision of deciding which adventure gets to come home.
No sugar rush required.
The school thanked Mrs. Laird and the Waukee Community Schools Foundation for helping provide the opportunity.
Worth Knowin’
Book vending machines are real, token-operated machines designed specifically for schools and literacy programs. Schools can use them for birthdays, reading goals, positive behavior or other rewards ~ and the student keeps the book that comes out.
Maybe the best part of this particular birthday treat is that it doesn’t disappear by the end of the day.
A good book might still be sitting on that child’s shelf years from now.
Deliverance Hope
Keep Goin’ ‘Round Town
There’s always another story waiting just around the corner.