INCLINE VILLAGE, Nev. — No, Bill Horn is not taking a vacation from the Incline Village General Improvement District until September.

But, he is taking a summer break from his weekly visits to Candy Van Meter's third grade classroom at Incline Elementary School until then.

For the past seven years, Horn has been a faithful weekly visitor to her classroom reading, visiting and encouraging young students to become readers.

“I feel so extremely lucky that he randomly chose my classroom and stayed for all of these years,” said Candy Van Meter.

Seven years ago, Horn said the Rotary Club of Tahoe-Incline started a special literacy program under the direction of its president at the time, Mary Jurkonis, and he started working in Van Meter's classroom. Once the program ended, he was the only member who decided to continue working with the children.

“My passion is reading,” Horn said. “You can't learn math, science or history without knowing how to read.”

Van Meter said Horn not only spends an hour reading with four or five students in her classroom, but he has become an important role model for all of the children in the class because he spends time telling them individually the importance of reading. It's gotten to the point, Van Meter said, where not just the children in his reading group look forward to his weekly visits — the entire class does.

“They all know he is an important person in the community and feel special because he takes time to come each week,” she said. “Sometimes he misses because of a meeting, but he is very faithful.”

In fact, the students feel Mr. Horn is so special they invited him to the parent's tea this year, where one of the boys in the reading group presented him with a rose. And when it was time to say good-bye at the end of the year, Horn did so with a pizza party for the entire class, and he gave each student a book.

At the pizza party, Van Meter said many students shared summer plans with him while he spent time visiting with each child.

“I buy the books so they will practice reading all summer,” Horn said about the books he gives to the students at the end of the year.

What really motivates Horn, though, is to see the students progress and be able to advance into fourth grade.

When school ended two weeks ago, the students had many comments to share and wrote special notes that were hand-delivered by Van Meter to Horn's office. A few of the comments were shared with the Bonanza:

“The pizza party with you was awesome!”

“We really like the books you bought for us, Mr. Horn!”

“You have really helped in our classroom!”

One student wrote: “Thank you for all the work you have done for the class. We really appreciate the help. I really liked the book and the pizza.”

Another wrote: “You Rock Mr. Horn.