Hoekstra takes over at Frazee Library Link Site
News | Published on September 30, 2026 at 7:27pm EDT | Author: Kendall Koenen
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By Robert Williams
Editor
A familiar face to many can be found at the Frazee Library LINK Site in new Coordinator Kaitee Hoekstra, who moved across the street after teaching language arts, leading the yearbook committee and coaching cross country at the high school for the past 12 years.
“I just wanted a change of pace and wanted to do something different,” Hoekstra said. “I loved coaching cross country but with the hours here I wouldn’t have been able to hold practice or go to meets.”
Hoekstra is still plenty busy. While she resigned from three positions at the school, she currently has three different jobs in the library, substitute teaching and working as a yoga instructor. She was certified and works at B Still Yoga in Perham, has classes at Northern Lights Dance Academy in Frazee and Saturday morning classes at Lakes Fit in Vergas.
“When I left, I still wanted to be involved in the community,” she said. “I don’t want a classroom anymore. My kids go to school here; we live in the community. I still want to be here. I’m just not going to be in the building every day.”
Mom time was also important. Kaitee and her husband Elliot have three young children. The transition away from the school was part of Hoekstra’s overall career plan.
“I knew going into teaching that I didn’t want to do it for my whole life,” she said. “I wasn’t going to be a 30-40 year teacher. I knew I probably wouldn’t last that long. It was more of a feeling.”
She began her yoga career in 2016 before taking a break to have children and is excited to be back in the field, as well as moving into the library.
The Frazee LINK Site is a branch of Lake Agassiz Regional Library, offering cardholders access to thousands of books and other items in the system’s shared collection.
“It was an easy transition to go from an English Language Arts teacher to a librarian; I have always loved reading, since I was 16 I would curl up with a book,” she said. “And I think it’s really important to get kids reading. I do my best as a parent to expose my children to books and to read to them and I love doing that with younger kids. The beautiful thing is subbing at the high school and the elementary I built in that branch. Did you know there’s a library and you can get graphic novels, Manga and young adult novels here? It’s not just adult novels in large print.”
While the small library does have shelves of available content, the majority of the community that uses the library chooses what they want to read via the library’s phone app to have that content delivered to Frazee for pickup.
The LARL Connect App is available on the App Store and Google Play Store and allows users to browse the library’s collection and download eBooks and Audiobooks.
The LINK site also provides copy services, Wi-FI, mobile hotspots for checkout, a public computer, an exterior book drop, printing, newspapers, DVDs, research and technology assistance, and scanning.
“I offer more than just books here,” said Hoekstra.
The Frazee location being so near the Becker and Otter Tail County lines also offers access to library card holders from the Lake Agassiz Regional Library and Viking Library Systems.
“It’s a reciprocal card; they just use their Viking library card,” she said.
New users are encouraged, especially this month as September is Library Card Sign Up Month.
Working closely with CornerStone also gives more kids access to the library.
“It’s been really cool to make all these connections,” she said.
Occasional presentations are held at the library as well. Recently, Minnesota author Carrie Classon was in Frazee to discuss her book “Loon Point.”
Students and adults can also take advantage of two statewide library services in the eLibrary Minnesota (ELM): offering free online databases, reference materials, and Ebooks Minnesota with no waitlists or login required for state residents. MNLINK (mnlink.org) is a statewide catalog that lets users request and share physical and digital materials across different Minnesota library systems.
“If students or people that are doing research and need resources from outside this tiny library or the DL library, they can request things here from MNLINK and that can pull from any library in Minnesota as long as you have your library card,” said Hoekstra.
Kaitee began working at the library in early summer and has seen a wide variety of users at the library and encourages more residents to take advantage of the services provided.
“It’s very underutilized,” Hoekstra said.
The Frazee Library LINK site is open Mondays 10:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m. and Thursdays from 12:30-5:30 p.m., and located across the street from the main high school entrance next to the Twice Blessed thrift store at 305 N. Lake Street.