The Great Purge

My library is in a state of change right now. Our Technical Services Department has moved off-site with our general delivery, and they have left a big gaping office in the basement. An office my department will soon occupy. When we move downstairs, our branch delivery will move into our old office and the public areas of the Children's Department will shift into the old delivery area (minus a big ugly wall) so that the circulation desk may expand.

In preparation for these changes, we have been hard at work cleaning and weeding. First, it was the collection. My staff cleared enough of our outdated fiction collection to be able to shift our audio books closer to their print counterparts, and we still almost had enough shelves to get our paperback series off of their current spinners. I personally hate the spinners because they block line of sight and the kids often leave messes when the paperbacks fall out and no one picks them up.

Other weeding projects have included the nonfiction area (we've cleared two full shelves so far and that's only from a few Dewey sections) and the CD collection. We'd like to be as lean as possible for the move, since we are unsure if we will have the same square footage that we currently own on the main floor. The things we have weeded so far have been very old and very unused. Some of them would even be candidates for Awful Library Books and I'm embarrassed that they were in my collection.

And speaking of some awful books that are in need of weeding, we've also been cleaning out our offices. Mostly, we've been purging old craft supplies and storytime props, but we've also been clearing out our desks. I'm lucky because I haven't been in my office long enough to accumulate much crap. However, I did have a bunch of crap on a shelving unit in my office that was inherited from my boss (who in turn inherited it from her boss and the Children's supervisor before that!). I was laughing so hard at some of the books that my Teen Librarian suggested I take pictures and post them here!

So, for your viewing pleasure, here are some fun pictures of "Ancient and Outdated Things I Found in My Office."

And the Budget is Decided

It was like that scene in Apollo 13 where Gary Sinise is in the simulator trying to figure out the sequence to reboot everything in the command module.

"The sequence looks good, Ken, but we're short on the amps," says the guy with the glasses in the control booth. At one point he suggests they give up the parachutes. Gary Sinise's character says, "Well, if the chutes don't open, what's the point?"

I feel like the Ohio state budget process has gone a lot like that conversation. The governor kept saying, "I don't have the money," while the reps kept saying, "But we NEED all of this stuff!" So, then the governor said, "Give up the chutes." In this case, it was libraries. And, somehow, they found a few more amps.

But, like the transfer of power from one battery to another in the movie, we're still losing a lot. $84 million, actually. My library has been pretty conservative with spending, so we should be okay. Other libraries will not be so lucky. They will be going forward with layoffs, merging branches, cutting services.

And the state is still not in any better shape. Revenues will continue to decline. I doubt that the money earned from the new gambling venture will make a dent in the hole we've dug ourselves into.

All any of us can do is to hope for a speedy recovery across the country. And a change in governor during the next election.

Summer Reading for Grown-Ups

Summer reading lists are everywhere. Teens come in looking for Of Mice and Men. First graders come in looking for The Cat in the Hat, and we've had adults working their way through the entire list of Oprah's pics. Some librarians take their lists from the local paper, while others are looking to Nancy Pearl for advice. Me? I usually take a stroll to the Classics Wall and pick out the first title I see that I haven't read yet.

Unfortunately, this year I've spent so much time planning the Summer Reading Program at the library that I haven't felt like picking up anything so deep. After all, it took me nearly three months this winter to get through The Magic Mountain, so I figured I'd better pick up books this summer that I actually had a chance of finishing before September.

Then, as I sat in the breakroom one day listening to two of my coworkers who happened to be reading The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoevsky, I looked down at the latest Janet Evanovich in my lap, and I felt very silly. I still don't have the time to pick up War and Peace, mind you, but I decided I definitely needed some brain food this summer.

That's when I realized that some of the books I have been reading, while not classics, are classic-ish. No, really! Here's the list:

The Neddiad: How Neddie Took the Train, Went to Hollywood, and Saved Civilization by Daniel Manus Pinkwater--This book is a retelling of The Illiad, which is one classic I haven't read. Set in post-WWII America, this book follows Neddie, the son of a shoelace entrepreneur as he makes new friends and discovers his inner hero. It was so good that immediately after I read it I grabbed The Yggyssey, the sequel based, of course, on The Oddyssey.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies by Seth Grahame-Smith--I waited for months for this one, and it didn't disappoint! Much of the book is taken directly from the original text, with hysterical scenes of zombie mayhem that read like a verbal version of Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon. My only complaint was the odd sexual references (lots of "ball" jokes), but I guess that's what you get when you let a guy rewrite Jane Austen!

Don't Panic! The Official Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Companion by Neil Gaiman--Okay, so this isn't exactly "classic," but how can you go wrong with a book about the quintessential sci-fi humor book written by a Newbery winner? I'd argue that both Douglas Adams and Neil Gaiman count as "New Classics" writers, and this book was just a delight. All of the "behind the scenes" drama of the Hitchhiker's story with all of the irreverence you've come to expect from Adams and Gaiman.

So, that is the start to my summer reading. I hope I can get at least one real classic in there before the end of August, but with all of the stress going on at work and at home, I'm not sure I can handle anything too serious. My brain might melt. Maybe I'll have to go get a Shakespeare comedy I haven't read yet... and fight the Teens for it!

Save Ohio's Libraries! (Or, Why I Want to Smack the Governor)

I've always watched library cuts and funding problems in other states and thought, "Thank God I live in Ohio." When I was in library school, the words "Library Utopia" were used as my professor described the funding structure that has kept our libraries stable and innovative when other states struggled and fought over territory. But now, thanks to Governor Ted Strickland, we may be in the same boat as everyone else.

Just as our libraries fill with patrons who check out DVD's instead of paying for cable, who come to free programs instead of taking their kids to a movie, who use our internet because they can't afford any service that will help them post a resume or apply for a job, just as all of this is going on our wonderful Governor wants to cut our funding IN HALF. Yes, folks, that's 20% we've already taken out, and a total of 50% over the next two years. Who can survive that???

Not many libraries, apparently. OLC says 70% of our local libraries have no local funding. With no time to put a levy on the ballot, these libraries will have to close. And who says the residents of those communities could afford to pay for a library even if they could throw a levy together and vote on it right now? There's a reason these libraries have not asked for local funding...

Even the big libraries will be hurting. My library stands to lose over a million dollars in funding. There will definitely be hours and jobs cut if this goes through, and we are one of the healthy libraries that had a "rainy day" fund of sorts to help get us through. Most libraries have to live leaner, and those will be in real trouble. Anyone who did a building project in the last three years is probably going to have a gorgeous, empty new building.

Now, I understand we are having a huge budget crisis. I understand there have to be cuts. We, as a library community, have been ready for the cuts. We've been tightening our belts and getting ready to poke a new hole. But, really, who can survive this kind of devastation?

Who will the schools turn to now that they've eliminated their school librarians and have cut their book budgets to the core? Who will come and do programs to substitute for cut art programs? Where will struggling students go to do their homework when our homework help centers close?

Where will the jobless go to file their unemployment? Where will those without a computer go to file an online application? Where will those about to lose their homes go for questions about the mortgage crisis and debt relief?

And how about all of the agencies beating down my door for children's and parenting programs because THEIR funding has been cut and they need the library to help them get through to families. What will they do? And where will they meet without our free meeting rooms?

So, go ahead and cut our funding, Mr. Strickland. We're used to doing what's right. Just don't slit our throats. Let us LIVE. Or you're sentencing Ohio citizens to years and years of torture while we build ourselves back up again.



If you want to help, I'm going to direct you to the great page the Columbus Metropolitan Library has come up with where you just put in your info and the email goes to your rep. Easy peasy. And the phone number and other useful information is there as well: Columbus Library Save Our Libraries

Summer Reading is Here!

Wow. I can't believe it has been over a month since I posted here. Life has definitely gotten in the way of my online activities. My computer has had some big glitches, and it continues to be slow. This makes blogging difficult. And I'm having a hard time getting motivated to even turn on my computer in the evenings when I just spent so many hours in front of my computer at work.

Work, of course, has been crazy busy. After all, I am a Children's Librarian in the midst of Summer Reading!

We had our kickoff last weekend, and I have to say it was a huge success. We partnered with the MetroParks, who were having their annual party to open the beach season at our local lakeside park. Last year, they had 1,000 attendees and we had 500 at our kickoff at Big Branch, so we were hoping for a turnout of about 2,000 max. The MetroParks estimated that 3,000 people were in the park during our 3-hour event Saturday!!!!

We signed up 200 kids for Summer Reading, 57 teens, and 20-some adults. We actually ran out of reading records for the kids, so we could have had even more. We had 14 activities for the families to participate in, including crafts and games. There were artists throughout the park (to go with the theme of "Be Creative") painting pictures. We had a display of local teen's artwork displayed in the Cafe building. We had a caricature artist doing free sketches for the kids. We had a balloon artist making cool crazy hats for the kids. We had a Drum Trail program and a local kid-band who played concerts down on the beach. We had the local collegiate summer baseball team handing out free tickets for the kids and doing meet-and-greet. We had three costumed mascots roaming through the crowd. We had a harpist and the local Children's Opera group doing performances in the Cafe building. And yes, there was the BEACH to play and swim!

It was an amazing day. We made the newspaper with big color photos, and everyone in the community seems to be talking about it. Our former director was in today and actually told me how great he thought the event was.

Everyone keeps congratulating me, but I don't really feel like I've done any of the work to deserve the credit. The MetroParks took care of the set-up and provided the venue. Staff members from each branch each took a table and were responsible for their own crafts. The artists throughout the park and in the Cafe did their own thing. Even the local baseball players were negotiated through our PR department and the MetroParks staff more than through my office. So, all I can really take credit for is being the runner and trouble-shooter on the day of the event. I spent most of my time looking for people and materials to make sure everything went smoothly.

We will definitely do this event next year, as the theme will be water. "Make a Splash," I think. That's kind of a no-brainer to have the event at the beach. :) But I'm glad this year's program is up and running. We have already signed up over 400 kids total for the program and close to 200 teens. The adult program is already at half of last year's total! That's pretty amazing considering storytimes haven't started yet--they're our biggest registration pool.

As for me, I'm already thinking ahead to the Fall Family Read-Aloud because all of the events from September to December have to be on the calendar by July 7. Not much time to pull together a systemwide program with prizes and ending events at each branch!

I will try to update more frequently about the programs we have going on this summer because there are so many amazing things going on. I just need to schedule myself some time to actually sit down and write!

On Cross-Checking Sources

Any librarian worth their salt knows that you should always check several sources when doing research in order to verify the facts. Every book is inherently biased because people are inherently biased. They have their own agendas, they have their own ideas. Even if all the experts agree, they can sometimes make mistakes in printing.

I expect to do this kind of fact checking when doing an in-depth research project. And, generally, the more mature the books are, the more reading you have to do to get at the truth. You don't usually expect there to be different opinions in preschool nonfiction. I mean, how hard is it to write the basic facts about what sharks eat or how long a whale can stay under water?

In the last few weeks, I have revised my view that you don't need to read many preschool nonfiction books to get an accurate picture. My son has a bit of an obsession with sea creatures right now, so we've gone from sharks to whales to tropical fish. And because my son wants to hear about these animals over and over again, I got many books out of the library on each topic. I figured, if I had to read about sharks every single night I might as well at least look at different pictures!

The first inaccuracies I found were in one of the shark books. For the most part, all of the books agreed that sharks were a special type of fish without scales (they have denticles instead) and a cartilage skeleton that live in all of the world's oceans. Then, there was one book that was absolutely gorgeous in its pictures and with some great ideas. Unfortunately, some of these ideas were wrong. For one thing, the book said with great enthusiasm that sharks are NOT FISH because of the aforementioned denticles and cartilage. Really??? Then what category are they? And why does every other book call them fish? The other error stated clearly that sharks could not live in the Arctic and Antarctic oceans. Wrong again! I had just watched an episode of Dirty Jobs where Mike Rowe spent quite some time pulling Greenland sharks out of the frigid waters of the northern ocean. And, again, all of the other shark books show that they do, in fact, live in all oceans. Not in the coldest parts of all oceans, but definitely in all oceans.

I alerted my staff member who orders animal books, and this book will be removed. A shame because it had such great pictures!

The next cross-checking reality check wasn't so much a glaring error as a difference in opinion. One book said a sailfish could travel at 70 mph, and another said 60 mph. Not a huge difference by any stretch of the imagination, but a good lesson for my 4-year-old in how different authors can interpret data differently. Perhaps a sailfish had been clocked at 70 mph, but that claim was disputed. So, the other book decided to take the earlier, slower data for their number. Or, maybe the 60 mph book is older and doesn't reflect the newest information. It doesn't mean the older book is bad, it just means you need to look at lots of different books to find the answers.

I never expected to be teaching my son information literacy skills at the age of 4, but it makes sense that this should be as important to his education as the words he's learning to read. My son is lucky because he has a librarian for a mom. But even the most diligent of mothers probably won't think of including this in their child's home education. And there's no way the preschools are taking this added pressure on when they have a hard enough time teaching kids their alphabet.

I am already thinking of how I can pitch this program to our local preschool next year for their student-parent classes!

On Failing Miserably

I've had programs that have "failed" before. Ones where no one showed up, or where just a few people stuck their head in. Being a perfectionist, it always bothers me. Especially if I did a lot of prep work for a craft or special storytime session. But I was always upset only on my own behalf. It was my program, it failed, and I just have to find something better to do next time. It never really affected anyone else.

Last weekend was my first stab at a Preschool and Daycare Fair. The Children's Librarian at our Big Suburban Branch held one that was very successful. I had my doubts about the viability of this program at our Main Library for several reasons. First, most of the kids in our neighborhood end up in Head Start by default. So, their parents aren't really hunting for alternatives or what is better for their child. And the parents that do care already have their places picked.

But I still wanted to try. So, I picked the Week of the Young Child to have our fair since that went with things the Daycares and Preschools were already doing. I sent out nice, professional letters to all of the centers we were aware of in the general area. I put ads in the paper, sent fliers to doctor's offices and out with Help Me Grow. I told myself I'd be happy if five centers decided to come.

Twelve centers came Saturday. And I had businesses calling that wanted to advertise to both the parents and the centers, which was a definite NO. Now, I was a bit worried. What if no one showed up and all of these centers were there? I'd be letting them down as well as myself. But, it's okay, I thought, I've done my advertising and we normally have a crowd on Saturdays.

Two problems: The first is that the ad I had hoped on didn't run because we are in the middle of a levy campaign, and that took the spot. Which is fine and I understand, but I think we really would have been helped by that ad. The second problem was the weather. It was the second day of 80 degrees and sun, and it was the first nice weekend of the spring. Curse you, Mother Nature! There was absolutely no one in the library. We had maybe five school-age kids on the computers all day and even the DVD racks were standing lonely on the first floor. Only the adult computer lab was busy, which did me absolutely no good.

Three families walked through the fair in two hours.

So, things I've learned for next time: Make sure I can have the ad run in the paper. Have the fair when we KNOW there will either be bad weather, or the families will be used to the nice weather and ready for a break. Run a normal preschool program of some sort before the fair to draw people in, then have them walk through the fair afterwards.

I just hope the Daycare Centers and Preschools weren't too mad at me for wasting some of their time on a Saturday afternoon. I'm writing them all nice, hand-written thank you notes. That will help, right?