Libraries Continue to Pitch in for Haiti

January 26, 2010

Library workers and educators are keeping their sleeves rolled up as they continue contributing to the international effort to provide moral and monetary aid to earthquake-stricken Haiti.

Boston Public Library's Mattapan branch, which now houses the city's resource center for area families seeking contact with Haitian loved ones and ways to help them. Operated by the Mayor's Office of New Bostonians, the center provides translators, crisis counselors, computers, and international phone lines.
[UPDATED] The Resource Shelf blog, which has compiled a list of resources about the Haiti crisis, including information about the a partnership through February 19 between the National Library of Medicine and the Association of American Publishers to offer free full-text articles from over 200 biomedical journals and over 30 select reference books for libraries and hospitals affected by the earthquake.
[UPDATED] The American Library Association, which has created an information page that includes instructions on how to contribute to the Association's Haiti Library Relief Fund.
Volusia County (Fla.) Public Library's Deltona Regional Library, which has donated use of its new ampitheater for a January 30 concert organized by the Deltona Arts and Historical Society. All donations are designated for the Red Cross.
[UPDATED] Garwood (N.J.) Free Public Library and the Central Arkansas Library System in Little Rock, which are giving overdue fines to Haiti relief efforts. Garwood PL has designated UNICEF as the recipient of fines collected through January 30; CALS is donating fines received until February 7 to the Clinton Bush Haiti Fund.
Library staff members of Indiana State University, who are holding a silent auction January 28 and donating the proceeds of winning bids and monetary donations to Mountain Top Ministries in Gramothe, Haiti.

At least one heartfelt effort was organized much closer to home: A library in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic—some 90 miles from the devastated Haiti capital of Port-au-Prince—began collecting clothes and toys donated by area residents just after the earthquake hit. "The Dominican Republic is so poor, yet [the people] donated stuff for the Haitian people," said Williamsport, Pennsylvania, volunteer George Way in the January 21 Williamsport Sun-Gazette. Way, who had traveled to the Dominican Republic with six other Pennsylvanians, was an eyewitness to the generosity.

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Latia Ward writes: “One way to keep current with what students think of the library and its services is through Student Library Advisory Committee meetings. These meetings are a way to gather feedback and reinforce the library as a welcoming place. How do librarians create a welcoming environment within Student Library Advisory Committee meetings? Librarians create a welcoming environment through community, purpose, and dedicated space.” Also see part 1 of this blog post.

RIPS Law Librarian Blog, Nov. 13, Dec. 5
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Eleanor Hecks writes: “Few things are as frustrating to a user as when a site won’t respond. Unfortunately, it’s also an all-too-common scenario. Graceful degradation is a design approach that ensures the basics of a website will still function even if specific individual parts of it stop working. The approach removes single points of failure: just because one thing stops working doesn’t mean the system as a whole fails. A site following this principle fails in pieces instead of all at once, so the most important features remain available when some components encounter an error.”

Smashing Magazine, Dec. 6
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Camruinn Morgan-Rumsey and Lexi Lepof write: “On December 3, Knox County (Tenn.) schools received a list from the district of books to be removed from school libraries under Tennessee’s Age-Appropriate Materials Act. Knox County’s board of education voted in July, passing a policy to remove ‘explicit’ books from everyday student access in response to the new law. Some of the books on the list of nearly 50 titles might surprise parents. Among those to be removed are Shel Silverstein’s A Light in the Attic and Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five.”

WVLT-TV (Knoxville, Tenn.), Dec. 4
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Joe Foley writes: “Copyright rules vary from country to country and have changed over time. In the US, works created between 1929 and 1963 that gave notice and renewed copyright have 95 years from their first publication date. That means that on January 1, 2025, a host of works from 1929 will enter the public domain. This means that copyright will expire on Buck Rogers, Captain Easy, Horace Horsecollar, Tintin, Hal Foster’s first Tarzan comic strips and, yes, Popeye.” Other notable works entering public domain in the United States include the Marx Brothers’ first film, The Cocoanuts, contralto Marian Anderson’s first record, and Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms.

Creative Bloq, Dec. 7; Everybody’s Libraries, Dec. 3, Dec. 7; Public Domain Review, Dec. 10
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Brittany Adams writes: “The digital landscape of libraries is expanding rapidly, with an increasing shift towards electronic resources and online services. As members of the library community, we’re witnessing a transformative era where physical collections are complemented—and sometimes replaced—by digital ones. This transition offers new opportunities for enhancing accessibility and engagement, but it also presents challenges, especially for young patrons and their families. It is essential to equip children and their caregivers with the tools and knowledge they need to navigate this evolving space confidently.”

ALSC Blog, Dec. 9
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Karen O’Grady writes: “I am the embedded librarian for the Hahn School of Nursing at the University of San Diego. I am surrounded by nursing faculty, staff, and students rather than by librarians. This has proven to be an incredible gamechanger for the way I see things. Every student in my school knows me by name. I am often stopped in the hallway to answer questions. Every correct answer I give increases my authority and builds trust. Through these casual mini-lessons, this foreign animal called ‘librarian’ slowly becomes an approachable, knowledgeable person.”

College & Research Libraries News, Dec.
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ALA has selected 46 participants for its 2025 class of Emerging Leaders (EL). The EL program allows library staff and information workers to participate in project planning work groups, network with peers, gain an inside look into ALA structure, and have an opportunity to serve the profession in a leadership capacity early in their careers. The group will take part in a day-long session during the 2025 LibLearnX conference in Phoenix this January and work for six months, culminating in a poster session at ALA’s 2025 Annual Conference and Exhibition in Philadelphia in June, where they will highlight results of their project planning work.

ALA Office for Human Resource Development and Recruitment, Dec. 4