Field Trips

Field trips take place at either the Book Bank or at our Willow Street location.

Book Bank field trips run Tuesday-Friday from 10:00 AM – 10:45 AM at 45 Bristol Street in New Haven. This location is right across the street from both Scantlebury Park and the Yale Police Department.

We will wait as late as mid-October to open up field trips scheduling so that teachers can check bus availability while booking their trip. To make sure you receive notification of when scheduling goes live, you can sign up for our Teachers email list .

Unfortunately, our space is not large enough to accommodate more than one classroom at a time, and we are not able to honor any such requests. Teachers may only bring the number of students enrolled in their class.

We have tried hosting older classes in the past, and have found that our programming doesn’t engage older students as much. Paired with the high demand from Pre-K to 5th grade teachers, we are not able to bring in older classes for a trip. However, we highly encourage you to request books for your students through the book orders program, or to visit in person to select titles for them!

Unfortunately, we cannot let classes arrive early or stay late. Our dedicated volunteers arrive and set up 15 minutes ahead of time to run the field trips. If we let your class in early, it is difficult and sometimes impossible to complete set-up. This, in turn, makes the field trip difficult to run. Similarly, please make sure your bus will return within 45 minutes to ensure that we are respectful of the volunteers’ time.

For Book Bank field trips, buses may park on Bristol Street between the corner and the NHR parking lot. Please note that buses which block the parking lot will be asked to move.

For classes that have English language learners, students who are reading above or below grade level, studying any specific subject matter, etc., you can send your requests to books@test.newhavenreads.org ahead of time and we will do our best to accommodate, dependent upon availability.

YES! You may feel free to browse our shelves along with your students. Additionally, you may request extra books for pick up through the book orders program. Except for board books, there is no limit for teachers choosing books for their classrooms.

Please use our online scheduler to book your trip! You can browse the calendar for available dates, and sign up for your selected date through the link in the calendar.

We offer field trips Tuesday-Friday from 10:00 – 10:45 AM. Generally, we cannot accommodate requests for different times, due to staff and other programming needs.

You may schedule ONE trip per year. The field trips program is incredibly popular, and we want to ensure that as many students as possible are able to visit us and enjoy this resource. There is, however, no limit on the number of book orders you can place throughout the year. We highly encourage you to request more books for your students through that program!

Although we know teaching can be hectic, we ask that all teachers personally schedule their own field trips. If we become aware that a trip was scheduled by someone else (your grade partner, a librarian, etc.) we will ask that the teacher actually visiting confirms the trip.

Yes! After you book your trip, you will receive the following confirmation emails.

1. You will receive a reminder from the Book Bank Director about a month before your trip.
2. You will receive one final confirmation the week before your field trip, asking you to confirm attendance.

The second email will ask you to confirm your attendance. If you do not respond, you will receive one confirmation call. Lastly, if NHR is unable to reach you, your field trip will be cancelled.

If you do not receive these emails, please check your Spam folder.

The number of teachers who want to come to field trips exceeds the number of trips we have available. As a result, we have felt the need to institute a strict cancellation policy.

It is essential that you notify New Haven Reads as soon as you are aware that you need to cancel. That way, we are able to schedule someone from the wait list with enough time for them to book a bus. You may send notification to books@test.newhavenreads.org.

Any last minute cancellations must be sent with at least 24 hours notice so that we can alert the field trip volunteers.

Any teacher who does not show up for a field trip, or who cancels within less than 24 hours, forfeits the right to book a field trip for the next academic year.

If any dates are still available, you may reschedule your field trip by emailing the Book Bank Director at books@test.newhavenreads.org.

If all dates are booked, we can only reschedule your trip if it is snowed out or cancelled for other inclement weather.