Telling the Library Story • Native American Materials Preservation Workshop • Celebrating Seniors • AskAway Awareness Week • Merlin Popular Holds • Useful URLs • Reflection

April 25 Millennium Tips and Tricks, 10:00 a.m. - 2:30 p.m., NWLS

May 2-4 Wisconsin Association of Public Libraries Conference, The Plaza Hotel and Suites, Eau Claire

May 15 Effective Library Marketing and Advocacy, 10:00 a.m. - 2:30 p.m., NWLS

May 21-22 Philosophy and Practice: The Preservation and Conservation of Native American Materials

June 14, 15 Library Directors Meeting

Summer 2007 UW-Madison SLIS Continuing Education Courses in Madison (If you have questions please contact Anna Palmer, ahpalmer@wisc.edu or 608-263-4452. Visit the School of Library and Information Studies for course descriptions and registration information.

Continuing Education Courses in Madison:

• June 4-7 Grant Writing, Instructor: Jane Pearlmutter
• June 25-29 Summer Camp by the Lake: Public Library Administration, Instructor: Kelly Krieg-Sigman
• July 14-25 Travel Opportunity-Librarians' Tour to Scotland, Tour Director: Jane Pearlmutter
• August 13-17 Summer Camp by the Lake: Cataloging, Instructor: Debra Shapiro
• August 20-24 Puppets in the Library, Instructor: Susan Santner

Online Graduate Credit Courses June 18 - August 12: Cataloging and Classification, Collection Management, Digital Libraries

Online Skills Courses: In cooperation with a national network of educational institutions, we offer online courses on a variety of technical topics and a few non-technical topics. While the courses do not have a library focus, they may be useful to anyone who needs to develop these skills.

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Telling the Library Story
From Jim Trojanowski, NWLS Director

This is National Library Week and libraries throughout the United States are holding special events in celebration. I recall a National Library Week several years ago during which I was asked by a patron what it means to be a librarian.

I shared a story from the earliest days of my career. I had only recently earned my library degree and I was working in the reference department of the Cedar Rapids (Iowa) Public Library. An older man, perhaps in his mid-70s, asked me to help him find a remote kill, or creek, in upstate New York. It took quite a bit of time, but we were able to find the name of a town near which the kill ran and locate the town on a map. The man thanked me and left the library.

The following spring I received a call from the man. He asked if I recalled helping him find the kill on a map and, without waiting for an answer, told me he was a direct descendant of the man after whom it had been named. As a young boy, the man had heard his family tell about this distant relative and the creek that bore his name and he’d pledged to visit the creek. Earlier in the week he had made this long-awaited trip, where he’d waded in the creek and reflected on his past. I listened, surprised to know that I could make such a difference in the life of someone I’d met for only a short time and pleased that the man would share his story with me.

Since then, I’ve had a woman explain that without the library she and her husband would never have determined which investment opportunity in his new employer’s retirement plan was the best choice for him – this was the first job he’d had that offered a retirement benefit and they found the choices confusing. I’ve had a young boy who participated in a library program for struggling readers leave his family at a restaurant to join me and my wife so he could tell me about a book he’d read. I’ve received a written note of thanks from a student pleased to learn about Wisconsin’s BadgerLink program, which provides indexing and full-text content to a wide variety of magazines and newspapers from the convenience of home, business, and school.

These are not my stories, but library stories. By sharing them we teach others about the differences we make every day. How is your library telling about the lives it has changed?

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Philosophy and Practice: The Preservation and Conservation of Native American Materials

Midwest Art Conservation Center has announced an upcoming workshop on preservation and conservation of Native American materials. The workshop will be held on May 21-22, 2007 at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts in Minnesota.

Gain an advanced understanding of how Native American collections should be treated during storage and exhibition from a Native American, Curatorial, and Conservation point of view.

The workshop lecturers are: Joe Horse Capture, a member of the A-ani (Grovan) tribe and Acting Curator of Africa, Oceania, and the Americas at the Minneapolis Institute of Arts and Susan Heald, Sr. Textile Conservator at the National Museum of the American Indian Cultural Resources Center.

The cost for this two day workshop will be $235 for MACC members and $295 for nonmembers. Discounts available to smaller institutions and to current students.

To register, visit www.preserveart.org, phone 612-870-3128, or email info@preserveart.org.

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Celebrate Serving Seniors (Especially) in May
by Marcia Sarnowski, Library Consultant, Winding Rivers Library System

Seniors, elders, olders, however you call them, folks over 50 are among your community's most valuable resources, and May has once again been designated as "Older Americans Month." This is a great opportunity to celebrate your seniors who come to the library, and make an effort to invite those who don't come often. The theme for this year's observance is "Older Americans: Making Choices for a Healthier Future," and you will find promotional resources you can use on the Administration on Aging web site at: www.aoa.gov

Libraries around the country are planning some interesting activities to mark the observance. Here are some that might work in your library:

• exempt seniors from fines during May
• offer a weekly drawing for seniors (prizes could be book bags, coffee mugs, items with the library logo)
• provide programs (at the library, or at nutrition sites) on "neurobics" (exercising your brain) or booktalks featuring the library's new popular titles available in large print and audio formats, and bring along some dvds of classic TV shows
• schedule a movie series featuring popular musicals which include dancing, have seniors lead dance demonstrations of the various steps
• display art work by seniors
• create a display of photos of local personalities when they were young - who are they?
• arrange an after-hours (or before-hours) party for seniors, with refreshments, to thank them for their contributions to the community (and to let them browse through the library on their own)

Things to do to make the library senior friendly:

• take a look at the labels on your large print books - are they clear and legible? Consider placing yellow transparent tape over the labels, easier for low vision readers to see
• create library displays of new large print books (and magazines)
• arrange a reading area with chairs with arms, and seats that are high rather than low, and plenty of good lighting
• make sure aisles are clear and at least 36" wide
• if you list community resources on your library's web page, consider adding a link to your county's Aging Unit web site
• evaluate your service options for seniors, and if you can identify a specific need, consider applying for a grant for funding to meet the need. Call us here at WRLS; we'd be happy to help you with this process.

One more idea: create a bulletin board or display with jokes and cartoons, and feature some of the library's funnier titles. Here is one I found on Horizon: When did I stop being Barbie & become Mrs. Potato Head?: learning to embrace the woman you've become, by Mary Pierce. Laughter is good for people of every age!

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ASKAWAY Awareness Week
From Renee Ponzio, Chairperson, AskAway Statewide Publicity Committee

In an effort to expand the awareness and use of AskAway, Wisconsin's 24/7 free online reference service, the AskAway Statewide Publicity Committee has chosen May 7-11, 2007 as "AskAway Awareness Week." We will be sending information to libraries with ideas that can be used by you to help spread the word about the AskAway Virtual Reference Service; bookmarks, posters, and celebration ideas that can be used through out the week and beyond, to let your patrons know about this great service available to everyone in Wisconsin 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. We are asking every library in Wisconsin to participate in some way this year. With your help we can make this the best promotion yet. We will be sending out more information on "AskAway awareness week" so be looking for it.

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Merlin Popular Holds
From Nikki Bolka, NWLS

The following titles have eight or more Merlin holds:
(Holds/Merlin copies)

57/26 .. Step On a Crack by James Patterson and Michael Ledwidge
44/10 .. The Pursuit of Happyness [videorecording(DVD)]
41/13 .. Happy Feet [videorecording(DVD)]
35/0 .... 6th Target by James Patterson and Maxine Paetro
33/10 .. Casino Royale [videorecording(DVD)]
32/14 .. The Secret by Rhonda Byrne
30/8 .... Blood Diamond [videorecording(DVD)]
30/16 .. I Heard That Song Before by Mary Higgins Clark
29/0 .... Night at the Museum [videorecording(DVD)]
29/0 .... Lean Mean Thirteen by Janet Evanovich
28/10 .. Eragon [videorecording(DVD)]
26/3 .... The Secret [videorecording(DVD)]
26/13 .. Babel [videorecording(DVD)]
25/15 .. The Departed [videorecording(DVD)]
22/6 .... The Holiday [videorecording(DVD)]
22/17 .. Nineteen Minutes: A novel by Jodi Picoult
20/0 .... Bobby [videorecording(DVD)]
20/0 .... The Queen [videorecording(DVD)]
20/7 .... Stranger Than Fiction [videorecording(DVD)]
19/3 .... Children of Men [videorecording(DVD)]
19/12 .. Flags of Our Fathers [videorecording(DVD)]
17/20 .. Sisters by Danielle Steel
16/4 .... Rocky Balboa [videorecording(DVD)]
16/4 .... The Good Shepherd [videorecording(DVD)]
15/11 .. Fresh Disasters by Stuart Woods
14/0 .... Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J. K. Rowling
14/5 .... Borat [videorecording(DVD)]
14/7 .... Marie Antoinette [videorecording(DVD)]
14/12 .. The Illusionist [videorecording(DVD)]
13/0 .... Dreamgirls [videorecording(DVD)]
13/0 .... Bad Luck and Trouble: A Jack Reacher novel by Lee Child
13/1 .... Notes on a Scandal [videorecording(DVD)]
13/6 .... Charlotte's Web [videorecording(DVD)]
12/0 .... Simple Genius by David Baldacci
12/0 .... Book of the Dead by Patricia Daniels Cornwell
12/7 .... The Prestige [videorecording(DVD)]
12/8 .... Man of the Year [videorecording(DVD)]
11/0 .... Invisible Prey by John Sandford
11/1 .... Volver [videorecording(DVD)]
11/4 .... Running with Scissors [videorecording(DVD)]
11/7 .... Flushed Away [videorecording(DVD)]
11/19 .. The Alibi Man by Tami Hoag
9/0 ...... Red Leaves by Belva Plain
9/1 ...... The Last King of Scotland [videorecording(DVD)]
9/3 ...... In an Instant: A family's journey of love and healing by Lee Woodruff
9/4 ...... A Good Year [videorecording(DVD)]

[print version]

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Garden-Based Learning
From Librarians' Internet Index

Garden-Based Learning is a compilation of gardening activities, projects, and other resources "for educators, volunteers, and parents working with children and youth." Some of the project themes include the food system, plants and textiles, produce marketing, and landscaping. Includes downloadable publications on topics such as city gardening, apples, peanuts, rice, and "the three sisters" (corn, beans, and squash). From the Cornell University Department of Horticulture.

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The library connects us with the insight and knowledge, painfully extracted from Nature, of the greatest minds that ever were, with the best teachers, drawn from the entire planet and from all our history, to instruct us without tiring, and to inspire us to make our own contribution to the collective knowledge of the human species. I think the health of our civilization, the depth of our awareness about the underpinnings of our culture and our concern for the future can all be tested by how well we support our libraries.

- Carl Sagan, Cosmos

Contact NWLS for subscription services to the Streams news: newsletter@nwls.lib.wi.us

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