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SELCO Librarian
Jeanne M. Steinbrink, SELCO-MLA Scholarship Recipient
Austin Public Library
Preconference
Day 1 started early Wednesday at 8:00 a.m. preconference when I attended Library Security: Everyone's Responsibility. Speakers Ben Trapskin, a senior librarian at Hennepin County, and Jeremy Johnson, a computer forensic evidence technician, kept us awake during the three-hour morning session talking about the transitioning of libraries from being information resources to becoming centers of culture and social gathering places.
Ben Trapskin started his presentation by referring to Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs. Ben emphasized that safety needs were second only to biological and social needs. With the advent of mobile devices such as cell phones and hand-held Internet devices, libraries are less needed as sources of information. Statistics show that 25% of youth are unsupervised at least part of the day, and the Internet and on-line games draw them to the library. Because of the shift to becoming gathering places for socializing and non-quiet activities, libraries have had to change their primary emphasis from providing collections to making library staff and patrons feel secure in the library. Patrons who do not feel the library is a safe environment will not walk through its doors to use its resources.
Jeremy Johnson discussed person crimes (gang activity, criminal sexual conduct such as child porn, e-mail threats) and property crimes (identity theft, selling stolen property on Craig's List) and how these crimes can take place at the library. Computer forensics involves gathering evidence from desktops, laptops, hand-held digital devices, and digital storage (discs, CDs, thumb drives) and is useful for recovering and analyzing data.
Ben talked of the importance of having procedure manuals in place and written policy. They both stressed the importance of documenting incidences to establish patterns of behaviors and getting the police involved early. Their presentation was timely as I am sure we have all seen the changes in the numbers and types of incidences in our libraries.
The noon luncheon featured Tim Spalding with his LibraryThing.com presentation on social cataloging. Tim entertainingly updated those of us new to world of social cataloging, and tenderly stepped on a few library sacred cow toes in the process. While being treated to a great lunch, we learned that LibraryThing offers users a way to personally catalog books they've read. Users can rate the book, tag it by category or subject heading, provide non-traditional catalog information, write a personal review and show cover pictures. LibraryThing helps you find others with similar interests. Tagging lets you search by non-Library of Congress subject headings, such as "chick lit" and you can combine tags to narrow your search. Overall, a fun way to spend my noon hour--but I missed my three mile walk.
Lauren Burnett's early afternoon conference session on Managing Negativity in the Workplace kept us alert as our minds slowed while our stomachs were digesting lunch. Lauren said we usually have six seconds from a trigger to a reaction. She helped us realize when we understand our triggers, we can control our reactions. She taught us how to relax during conflict by standing firmly with shoulders down, arms at our sides and calmly breathing in and out through the nose. She said, "The person conceived to be the calmest is the person conceived to be the most confident." I've been to one of her presentations at an earlier conference and this was a good refresher.
The final Wednesday session I attended was 23 Things: Better Than a Deep Fried Twinkie. It was interesting to hear from the panel of four people who were among the 600 who had finished all 23 Things. Tim Johnson, Erika Rux, Linda Weinmann and Lynn Wyman spoke on the favorite things they learned. Picasa, which is similar to Flickr, had terrific photo editing tools and was also great for creating and printing posters you could use in your library. Another liked www.meeebo.com for linking Aim, Yahoo, Google Talk and MSN IM (instant messaging) accounts. You Tube (watch "The Machine is Using Us") and Google calendar were other useful library tools. Another panelist noted how 23 Things increased staff confidence and their general competency with Web 2.0 tools. Another mentioned how using some of the tools had streamlined his work and how 23 Things created a new social network community. If you haven't finished the 23 Things, it is still available--keep going. Watch for More Things on a Stick in January 2009.
Mollie Pherson, Regional Librarian
I always have so much fun at these conferences because I get to visit with library friends throughout the state that I don't get to see on a regular basis AND I get to learn new and exciting things about what's going on in libraries!
My day started with the keynote speaker luncheon that featured Tim Spalding, founder of LibraryThing. I've been a LibraryThing user for a little over two years now and to listen to Tim speak was really great! To think I can actually compare my personal collection and Thomas Jefferson's personal collection is incredible!
After lunch, I headed to the silent auction. Currently, I'm in a bidding war for a super cool Minnesota Wild Hockey Pack! I hope I win it.
The first conference session I attended this afternoon was Managing Negativity at Work. Lauren Burnett, facilitator for and President of the Center for Inner Quality, presented information about how to deal with negative situations in one's life and how to prevent negative situations from occurring. Lauren shared the top 11 causes of negativity in the workplace, saying that if we are all aware of these things, we can possibly prevent a negative situation from occurring:
1. Hurt feelings, seldom given support or positive feedback
2. What you want to do is in conflict with what you feel you should do
3. Not feeling as good about yourself as you'd like
4. Being taken advantage of
5. Hurt feelings, being rejected by others
6. Work criticized by others
7. Being isolated from people
8. Fear of change
9. Taking action too slowly
10. Being forced to lower job standards
11. Negativity has become a habitual pattern
Here are some other interesting ideas she presented:
- You have six seconds to hi-jack any negative objects before they affect you.
- The person who is perceived as the calmest is the person who is perceived as the most confident.
- To calm your own personal negative feelings, think of 3 things that are bugging you, then 2, and then 1. Then, switch the focus to something positive by thinking of 1 positive thing, then 2, then 3.
- Exhale to relax your body when in a stressful situation.
She also talked a little about work gossip and how that can totally affect a working environment. She basically said if you have listened to gossip, you have engaged in it (even if you didn't say anything). If you find yourself in an uncomfortable situation, just say straight out, "I'm uncomfortable talking about this" or switch to another common positive topic--avoid becoming "one of them." Lauren said that the supervisor role is key because that person needs to be able to identify the gossipers when things get out of hand and needs to set the standards as to what is acceptable in the workplace. Gossip grows because communication is lacking, so always keep communication between workers flowing. Overall, it was a very interesting presentation!
The second conference session I attended was with Rebecca Patton from the Arrowhead Library System that focused on the Minnesota Library Certification Program. The Minnesota Certification Program is for library staff and is intended to improve the library services in Minnesota and it encourages library staff members to further develop library skills. Although it was a small group (only three people), the session was really informal and informative. Rebecca shared a little bit about the Minnesota Certification program and then guests asked questions about the program. Because I'm on the Certification Steering Committee and I will be a homework reader in the SELCO region, I wanted to know everything I can about the MN Certification program. FYI--If you are interested in participating in the MN Certification and you are in the SELCO region, please contact me and I can help answer any questions you may have about the program.
My last stop this evening will be the 23 Things Party on a Stick between 7:30-8:30 p.m. to do some social networking and grab some Ice Cream on a Stick. Woo hoo!
Jonya Pacey, Help Desk Manager
I enjoyed the Wednesday luncheon speaker, Tim Spaulding, LibraryThing.com founder who calls his site a 'social network of some fairly intelligent people." He discussed not just the adding of records into the 'shared mental universe' of LibraryThing, which is all it is, being a metadata database about books, not the books themselves. But also he spoke of the tagging, of the weighted results lists you can pull up, of the Legacy Libraries ("I see dead people's books") and how you can compare your own library to other people's and discover shared interests and common bonds. He shared some of the more interesting tags and how they can be TagMashed to narrow down your results, something it is not easy to do using LoC subject headings. And I found it interesting that he had a great passion for his product and what it had added to the world. He said of tagging "These are real. Tagging tells us what a book means to people and how they see the world." Tagging and reviews are usually written by people who have completed the book and are moved to say something. However, this augments subject headings, it does not replace them. In this room of librarians, he was careful to point this out.
I have a LibraryThing account but did not realize how much I have missed, how much more I could be doing with it. I want to try it out, figure out what would be useful for me and others and teach other people how to use it. So before I go into the Vendor's area for refreshments, I wanted to post this. I will confess I cannot figure out yet how to see the Legacy Library list, of people like Thomas Jefferson and John Adams and Marilyn Monroe's private libraries, but I will.
Ann B. Hutton, Executive Director
From Awareness to Funding, the most recent report from OCLC Online Computer Library Center Inc., affirmed aspects of my own experiences based on years of advocating for libraries and offered some surprises. Primary findings of this lengthy and statistically sound demographic study funded through the generous and continuing support of the Bill and Melissa Gates Foundation include:
- Library funding support is only marginally related to library visitation
- Perceptions of librarians are an important predictor of library funding support
- Voters who see the library as a 'transformational' force as opposed to an 'informational' source are more likely to increase taxes in its support.
Cathy De Rosa, OCLC Vice President for the Americas and Global Vice President of Marketing, keynoted a recent MINITEX workshop. She shared the good news that there are increased possibilities to change the trend of flat or decreasing library funding as there is latent support for libraries. However, the challenge will be to shift these latent feelings about the library into real support at a time when there are ever increasing demands on the public sector. Library advocates must do a better job positioning the library as part of local infrastructure.
Two key results did not surprise me. First, the correlation between support for library funding and library visits is fairly low and secondly, the positive impact library staff on funding potential. For years, I have worked with dedicated community residents around southeastern Minnesota who take great pride in their library but are not necessarily among its regular users. While I considered this disconnect between support and use strange, I’ve never rejected the proverbial “gift horse” of their support. Despite a myriad of rules (2-week checkouts for some items, 3-day checkouts for others, different fine rates, etc.) library staff members come to work each day ready and willing to help the library user. And, library customers respond with repeat visits and speaking well of library services.
The response by local elected officials regarding library visits was a surprise. Based on the survey responses, elected officials report 19 library visits a year. While this certainly contradicts anecdotal reports from local library directors and library registration records, the good news in Chapter 3 istates 73% of local elected officials have a positive impression of the library and 77% feel the library provides essential resources that some people could not otherwise afford.
The “Emotional and Intellectual Rewards Framework” graph in Chapter 4 depicts my other surprise. The four-quadrant chart is defined as “Transformation, Information, Purpose, and Escape.” Respondents firmly classify the public library as providing “information with a purpose.” Great – right? We accomplished the goals of so many publicity campaigns denoting the library as an information place. But – no! The report reveals that those willing to spend more money on libraries want the library to transform. Despite publicity that shouted information, library audiences did not make the intuitive leap that possessing information can transform one’s life. After nearly a decade of the @your library campaign, ALA can claim a degree of success but will want to craft a new message based on this OCLC study.
SELCO has copies of From Awareness to Funding in the professional collection and I encourage you to check it out
Abbey Thompson, LSTA Project Cataloging Librarian
On October 23rd, I drove down to Kansas City, Missouri for the Midwest chapter meeting of the Music Library Association. While we all know that the library world is a little too full of organizations with the acronym of MLA (the Modern Languages Association, Medical Library Association, Minnesota Library Association, just to name a few), this particular MLA is near and dear to my own heart. Ive been attending various MLA functions since starting library school, and every conference has been nothing less than stellar. This meeting was no different, full of useful information and learning opportunities blended with copious prospects for networking and social interaction with fellow music librarians. The session on providing access to sheet music collections was particularly enlightening, considering my work with the Chatfield Brass Band collection. Though new to this particular chapter (previously I attended chapter meetings in the Southeast region), I felt immediately welcomed and encouraged by my new peers.
I have now been working with SELCO for just over three months, on the Chatfield Brass Band Music Lending Library project. My excitement for the project has only grown in this time, and I particularly wanted to take the opportunity at this conference to spread awareness of this amazing collection and the work that SELCO is doing to make it more accessible. By the end of the weekend, the question that I had answered the most was, without a doubt, What is SELCO? The majority of music librarians work in academic library settings, so to be confronted with a name-badge bearing our unfamiliar acronym, rather than a university or college, was initially baffling to some. Once explanations were made, however, I received nothing but praise and excitement about the project. Most of the people I spoke with had never heard of the Chatfield Brass Band Music Lending Library, and were stunned to hear of the size and scope of the collection. It truly is a unique resource, and I was overjoyed to see such a positive response from these fellow music librarians to both the collection itself and the work that SELCO has done on its behalf. Eliciting this kind of response was truly my goal for the conference to spread the word about the collection and SELCOs role in its transformation. By all accounts, this mission was an overwhelming success.
Donovan Lambright, Automation Librarian
About a week and a half ago, I posted some information about the upcoming Horizon upgrade. I'd like to follow up with some more details about Pre-Overdue Email Notices. As described in my previous post, Pre-Overdue Email Notices:
- are email only. Patrons receiving paper notices will not get them.
- are optional by Online Library. If you don't want to use them, you don't have to.
- go out a few days before the due date with the exact timing determined by each library. The timing can be set by BTYPE.
- can be enabled at the time of the upgrade or at a later date. They can also be disabled if the library changes its mind.
A few more details have come to light as we digest the release notes for the upgrade:
- Each patron record will have a check box that determines if he/she will get Pre-Overdue Email Notices. If your Online Library chooses to have this functionality enabled, all patrons with your library as their Location will have this checked by a script run against the database.
- We're still unclear about what happens after the upgrade. Will you have to manually check this box every time you create a new patron record or will it be checked by default? We don't know yet. If it is not checked by default, we will modify your patron record view to check it automatically for you. That's Plan B. Plan A is that Horizon will take care of it for us. Either way, however, you're covered.
- Because this functionality is enabled in each patron record, an Online Library could choose to have only some patrons get Pre-Overdue Email Notices. SELCO does not recommend such an approach without a REALLY good reason. The opportunities for confusion are just too great. A better approach would be to not put email addresses in the record of any patron who you don't want getting Pre-Overdues.
That's it. It's pretty simple, really. Once you decide to enable this functionality, it just works. Like other email notices, you don't have to do anything on a day-to-day basis to send them out.
Based on this information, SELCO would like email from each Online Library to let us know if you want Pre-Overdue Email Notices enabled. If you're not sure or need to talk to your Board or Principal, don't worry. We can turn them on (or off) for you at a later date. Please send your email to preoverdues@selco.info by 12-04-2008. If you have any questions, please contact the SELCO Help Desk.
Donovan Lambright, Automation Librarian
In our never-ending attempts to block spam on the SELCO email server, while leaving legitimate email intact, we have taken another step. Last week, we began blocking all email from carefully selected countries known to be spam havens. This is not a step we took lightly. We first considered blocking such email about a year ago and decided against it as too overreaching a solution. Increasingly sophisticated messages, including some inviting recipients to click links to get "Presidential election news", caused us to reconsider.
Having decided to block all messages from spam havens, we consulted a number of lists maintained by anti-spam groups. The highly regard anti-spam group Spamhaus, for example, gave us this top 10 list of spam origin countries:
- United States
- China
- Russian Federation
- South Korea
- United Kingdom
- Germany
- India
- Brazil
- Japan
- France
Well, we knew we weren't going to block email from the US. Nevertheless, comparing such lists with the statistics from our spam filter yielded good results. In the end, we decided to block all messages from the following six countries. This table also shows how many messages came to the SELCO email server from each country from 10-14 to 11-13:
| Country | Email Messages Sent to SELCO from 10-14-2008 to 11-13-2008 | Email Messages Blocked as Spam |
| Aruba | 115 | 115 |
| Russia | 12,000 | 12,000 |
| Taiwan | 4,500 | 4,500 |
| Hong Kong | 350 | 350 |
| China | 12,000 | 12,000 |
| Ukraine | 5,500 | 5,500 |
You read that correctly. All of the email received from these countries during the month examined were spam. During this time period, we blocked 212,000 spam messages. Adding up the numbers on this chart, we find that 34,465 came from these six countries. That's about 16%.
It's another step forward.
Donovan Lambright, Automation Librarian
As part of our planning for the upcoming AquaBrowser catalog implementation, SELCO is gathering information on research databases purchased locally by Online Libraries. Along with the databases provided by the state and by SELCO, these databases will be searchable in the new catalog. Please return, via email to me, the names of any databases your library has purchased that you would like in the new catalog by Friday, November 21. I realize that MLA is coming up but we need a quick turnaround on this question in order to get contract negotiations moving.
In case you are wondering, locally licensed databases will be searchable only by patrons who are entitled to access. There are several means of achieving this and we are still working out the method that will work best for us. You can rest assured however, that including your databases in the catalog will not automatically make them accessible to the entire region and thus violate your license agreement with the database vendor.
Please contact the SELCO Help Desk with any questions.
Mollie Pherson, Regional Librarian
Happy Friday!
FYI--The Minnesota Library Day at the Legislature has been announced for 2009! MN Library Day will be held on March 25, 2009. Save the date and spread the word by telling your friends, board members, and supporters. Registration and other information about the day will be forthcoming, so keep checking back for more info.
Also, big news regarding the Cooperative Summer Library Program! The artists have been announced for the 2010 children's and teen programs. Henry Cole will be creating the artwork for the children's 2010 program and Ursula Vernon will be the artist for the teen 2010 program. I know the 2009 SRP program hasn't taken place yet, but the news is exciting nonetheless! If you haven't gone to the 2009 SRP website yet, check it out!
Donovan Lambright, Automation Librarian
With today's announcement that the SELCO Horizon ILS is to upgraded in December, a lot of you in the Online Libraries are sure to have questions. We are still pulling together release notes and other documentation for the SELCO website but I can tell you a few things now:
Q. Is the entire ILS really going to be down for the whole day on December 08?
A. Yes, with a few caveats. The upgrade will include all four major subsystems of the ILS: Horizon server & databases, Horizon client (the software you use on PCs), iPac, and WebReporter which means that every subsystem will be down at some point in the day. Hypothetically, it is possible that some subsystems might become useable before the rest are ready. For example, if everything is working except WebReporter, the other subsystems will be useable. If some subsystems come up then we'll let you know. For example, if the staff client and Horizon server are ready for use while iPac is still down, we will contact you. Such updates will be sent out via email to Directors and Automation Contacts (DIRPUB, DIRSCH, CONPUB, and CONSCH). As to the timeframe, SirsiDynix will begin first thing in the morning, at 8:00 AM Central. Right now, we have a best estimate of four to eight hours but it's not an exact science. Keep an eye on your email for the most recent and accurate information. An alternative option to save you the hassle is to simply tell your staff and patrons to expect things to be down all day. Each Online Library will have to make its own judgment on that. If you're not sure what to do, give us a call and we'll talk it over with you.
Q. Will I have to upgrade my Horizon client software?
A. Only if you are not moved onto Citrix MetaFrame. For Citrix sites, your client software runs on our server farm and we'll upgrade it (the one upgrade we're still allowed to do). You can just sit back and relax. If you are not up on Citrix, we'll send you an upgrade CD about a week before December 08. You'll need to run it on all of your Horizon PCs. This is the same procedure we've used on past upgrades.
Q. What will happen to Pharos when the Horizon patron database is not available?
A. When the Horizon server and databases go down, Pharos will be unable to authenticate your patrons. Your public internet PCs will still be usable. Pharos will continue to run and will ask patrons to enter their barcodes but will do nothing with the data. The good news is that things will appear to be working normally. The bad news is that Pharos will not catch repeat patrons, those with delinquencies, or others who should not be able to log in. Once the Horizon server and databases are back up, Pharos should resume working normally, even if the rest of the upgrade is not yet completed. We'll send email updates to Pharos sites using the PHAROS_SITES distribution list as the situation changes throughout the day.
Q. What is the best new feature that comes with the upgrade?
A. Most of the modifications made by this upgrade are bug fixes and small, behind-the-scenes changes. There is, however, one very cool new feature: Preoverdue Notices. Preoverdue Notices are just what the name implies: notices that go out to your patrons BEFORE their items are due. A few things you should know:
- Preoverdue Notices are email only. Patrons receiving paper notices will not get them.
- Preoverude Notices are optional by Online Library. If you don't want to use them, you don't have to.
- Preoverdue Notices go out a few days before the due date. The exact timing is determined by each library. The timing can be different for different BTYPEs.
- Preoverdue Notices can be enabled at the time of the upgrade or at a later date. They can also be disabled if the library changes its mind.
Further information on Preoverdue Notices and other changes to Horizon will be emailed out and posted to the SELCO website shortly.
As we learn more about the December 08 upgrade, we will post it here and send email to Directors and Automation Contacts. Please feel free to contact the SELCO Help Desk if you have a question that has not been addressed.
Michael Scott, Assistant Director
On October 27, 2008, I had the opportunity to visit St. Mary's School in Owatonna, a SELS member. St. Mary's School is a Kindergarten - 8th grade school which also houses a preschool for children ages 3-5 years old. The student body is 352 in K-8 and 55 preschool students. The school is affiliated with 2 Catholic parishes in Owatonna, St. Joseph's Catholic Church and Sacred Heart Catholic Church.
During my visit, I met with Sharleen Berg, the school's library media specialist. Sharleen has been with the school since 1996 and started working in the library in the past couple of years. The library is located on the second floor of the school and houses a collection of books and other library materials for students. There is a reading area that is set aside for storytime which has a wooden throne for the reader of the story to sit in and wooden bleacher-style seating for those enjoying the story. The furniture in this area was built by volunteers and is really beautiful. You can check it and other pictures from my visit on SELCO's Flickr site.
The school has been very supportive of its library and has continued to provide additional funds to enhance the collection. In addition to enhancing the collection, Sharleen is working with teachers at St. Mary's School to further integrate the library into the curriculum (which she is very passionate about!) The library does have an online catalog (Follett) for its students and staff. To see more about library, click here.
I want to say a big "Thank You!" to Sharleen for allowing me to visit St. Mary's School.
