May/June 2011

Features & Trends

Professional Growth through Learning Communities

By Paul Signorelli and Lori Reed

When we library staff members are struggling to respond to incoming phone calls, email, text/instant messages, tweets, Facebook and LinkedIn updates, and people stopping us in hallways to ask for help, it’s easy to forget that we, too, need learning resources and communities of support. Many of us who are responsible for organizing and providing … Continue reading Professional Growth through Learning Communities →

Fanbase to the Rescue: A Massachusetts Tale

By Eric T. Poulin

While much has been written recently about using Facebook as a promotional tool for libraries and librarians, opinions vary widely on Facebook’s effectiveness in reaching library users. It’s indisputable, though, that Facebook can successfully promote advocacy on behalf of library-related issues, based on the creation of a Facebook Page that generated community awareness in western … Continue reading Fanbase to the Rescue: A Massachusetts Tale →

Refresh Your View of E-rate

By Marijke Visser

Suffering from the after-school network grinding-to-a-halt syndrome? Have a flat or declining budget with little state or local political support? Can’t figure out how to pay for a bandwidth upgrade to support patrons’ online activities such as searching for jobs and applying for e-government services? If you haven’t considered the e-rate program lately, now’s the … Continue reading Refresh Your View of E-rate →

Keeping Our Message Simple
By James LaRue
Magical Meals
By Kathy Cannata
Facebook for Libraries
By David Lee King
The Best in Library Branding
By Judith Gibbons
Reading for Life: Oprah Winfrey
By Leonard Kniffel
Renewing Our Mission in New Orleans
By Pamela A. Goodes
Keeping Library Digitization Legal
By Bobby Glushko
Library Advocacy: One Message, One Voice
By Richard M. Dougherty

Columnists

WordPress as a Library CMS
By Kyle M. L. Jones and Polly-Alida Farrington
New from ALA
by Mary Ellen Quinn
The Ancient World
Bill Ott
Volumes of Vernacular
By Mary Ellen Quinn
The Road to New Librarianship
By Mary Ellen Quinn
A Compendium of Communication
By Mary Ellen Quinn
A Facility Forever Young
By Jennifer Burek Pierce
The Digital Revolution and the Transformation of Libraries
by Keith Michael Fiels
We Never Close
by Brian Mathews
Wrapping Up a Busy Year
By Roberta A. Stevens
My Professional Heroes
Will Manley
Too Much Information?
by Meredith Farkas
Reviving the Spirit of Andrew Carnegie
By Mark Herring
A Numbers Game
By Joseph Janes

Latest Library Links

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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
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On December 9, ALA announced a $25 million bequest by James W. Lewis, of Washington, D.C. The gift, the largest individual bequest in ALA’s history, will fund scholarships for aspiring librarians with demonstrated financial needs. Throughout Lewis’s career at Merrill Lynch, where he leads the Lewis Group as senior vice president and senior relationship manager, he has demonstrated his commitment to libraries and their communities by generously volunteering his time, including as a member of the Board of Visitors at the library of his alma mater, Wake Forest University in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. He also served as a Library Trustee Board member at District of Columbia Public Library for 10 years.”

AL: The Scoop, Dec. 9
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Tess Prendergast writes: “I will never forget the surprised look on one mom’s face during storytime when I dropped a tip—technically called an aside—about how rhyming helps babies differentiate sounds and prepares them for reading. “You mean that all this singing will help her in school?” she asked. “I thought we were just doing this for fun!” Early literacy activities are certainly fun—but also valuable. Many parents and caregivers aren’t aware that simple, everyday activities can benefit their child’s early language and literacy development and have a lasting positive impact on their learning.”

American Libraries column, Nov./Dec.

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