Students now have the ability to read from a host of different mediums and become involved in new activities at the Palo Alto High School library.

Firstly, the library now has 30 Amazon Kindles that students will be allowed to check out. The librarians have also introduced a download library that enables students to download books off the Internet.

According to Librarian Rachel Kellerman, students now have a library card number on their student ID. Students can then use the number to check out up to four books at a time from the download library. Currently, the download library contains 600 books, but Kellerman hopes to expand the download library this year.

“I hope that kids check that out, and you can download it onto any device, smart phone, a tablet, a computer, or you can check out one of our Kindles or a Nook,” Kellerman said. “Visual reading is up 45 percent in America, we’re actually one of the world leaders in digital reading, so I hope that kids check it out.”

Kellerman is also hoping to do an event during Banned Books Week, which will go from Sept. 30 to Oct. 6. She is interested in having students read excerpts from banned books and uploading them onto the Banned Books Week website.

“I think that Paly is a very progressive school and we celebrate the freedom to read,” Kellerman said. “Many other schools are not as progressive and I think that we should be leaders in celebrating the right to read. So I’m hoping to get people excited about that this year.”

The library’s annual book club will also feature a challenged book.

“I’m choosing between two challenged books, “Slaughterhouse Five” [by Kurt Vonnegut], which I’m rereading, and “The Perks of Being a Wallflower” [by Stephen Chbosky],” Kellerman said.