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Brian Barrett writes: “January 13 was a fairly eventful day, at least for prepandemic times. Cory Booker dropped out of the presidential race. LSU trounced Clemson in the college football national championship game. Attorney General William Barr asked Apple to unlock an iPhone. And Google pushed out a seemingly tiny tweak to how it displays search ads for desktop computers. The result was a general smoothing: Ads looked like not-ads. Not-ads looked like ads.“ -
The COVID-19 crisis has raised questions that library and museum workers have never had to ask themselves before: How long does a virus last on materials? How can we mitigate exposure to staff and visitors? Is it safe to reopen? The REopening Archives, Libraries, and Museums (REALM) project aims to make these questions easier to answer. In Test 4 results, announced September 3, scientists found that COVID-19 is still detectable after six days on four common library materials when they are stacked: the covers of hardcover books (buckram cloth), the covers of softback books, DVD cases (polypropylene), and Mylar protective book cover jackets. -
Increasingly, cities across the US, along with a handful of public libraries, are writing and following their own climate action plans with objectives for reducing emissions and energy consumption, preparing for disasters, addressing residents’ climate concerns, meeting other sustainability goals, or all of the above. Given the lack of broad national climate legislation or initiatives, many cities see CAPs as a way to take matters into their own hands—and libraries are emerging as partners, innovators, and originators. -
In honor of the Association for Rural and Small Libraries Conference (September 28–October 2), American Libraries presents statistics on the buildings, staff, bookmobiles, and users of small and rural libraries. ARSL was founded in 1982 by Bernard Vavrek, director of the Center for the Study of Rural Librarianship at Clarion (Pa.) University. The typical rural library employs 1.9 full-time staff members, in a space that is 2,600 square feet on average. Kentucky has the most bookmobiles of any state: 75. -
Denis Cotter has resigned as a chairman and member of the Loudoun County (Va.) Library Board of Trustees following the Board of Supervisors’ decision to use two libraries to expand the county’s childcare services. Cotter did not specify his reason, but it comes after the Board of Supervisors ratified the decision on September 1 to use the Ashburn and Rust branches for childcare services. The move came after a couple weeks of planning and the school system’s decision to operate at 100% distance learning to start the 2020–2021 school year. -
Anna Gooding-Call, occasional Librarian’s Library columnist, writes: “Modern readers, myself included, tend to take novels for granted. Yet for most of human history, this would have been astonishing. The quantities involved, the general literacy of the population, and the carelessness with which we treat these cheap books would utterly floor the monks who spent their lives hand-copying script. That’s why it’s so interesting to think about the novel’s origins. Why was the first novel written? What need did it fill? And most importantly, can you still read it today?” -
On September 16 at 1 p.m. CT, Core: Leadership, Infrastructure, Futures, a new division of ALA, will present the webinar “Creating a Strategic Library Communication Plan to Convey the Library’s Value and Values.” This webinar will outline the purpose and development of a library’s values, mission, and vision statements, a strategic plan, a communication plan, and the embedding of that plan in organizational culture. -
Italian astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti writes: “One of the funny little things I noticed after having lived in space for a while is that, contrary to everyday experience on Earth, it took some effort to keep my arms pressed against my body. Had I remembered better my childhood reading, I wouldn’t have been surprised. Jules Verne imagined this back in 1865.” -
The clichéd and vague notions about outreach services for teens that so many librarians encounter in job descriptions and performance evaluations do not reflect the importance or day-to-day realities of this undertaking. Designed for those new to the profession, Jess Snow’s new primer Outreach Services for Teens: A Starter Guide, published by ALA Editions, shows readers how to apply a full complement of professional skills, creativity, analysis, and resourcefulness to the conception, delivery, and evaluation of teen outreach. -
Focusing on the challenges and opportunities in working with metadata for unusual types of content, “Expand the Horizon: Challenges and Opportunities in Working with Metadata for Unusual Content Types” will explore the creation, management, and preservation of metadata. This webinar is one of the first from the new ALA division Core: Leadership, Infrastructure, Futures, and will be presented on September 23 at 1 p.m. CT.
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If you need a bit of financial help to get through your graduate program, scholarship funds are now available. ALA has more than $300,000 available to students who are studying in library science or school library media programs at the master’s degree level. Scholarships range from $2,500 to $8,000 per student per year. They include scholarships for students who are interested in children’s librarianship, youth librarianship, federal librarianship, new media, and library automation. In addition, scholarships are available for minorities, persons with disabilities, and people who are already employed in libraries but do not have an MLS. The application deadline is March 1, 2021. -
ALA and SAGE announced Courtney M. Dalton as the recipient of the 2020 Peter Lyman Memorial/SAGE Scholarship in New Media. Dalton works as a library assistant at Manor College in Jenkintown, Pennsylvania. She hopes to specialize in archives management and digital humanities when she completes her degree program. The Peter Lyman Memorial/SAGE Scholarship in New Media was created in memory of Peter Lyman, former university librarian and professor emeritus of the School of information at the University of California, Berkeley. Lyman’s research focused on online information, ethnographic analyses of online social relationships and communities, and bringing university librarians into the digital era.
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