The Library Connection
The Monthly Newsletter of the Eastern
Shores Library System
www.esls.lib.wi.us
Volume 29 Number 8 August 2009
September is library card Sign up month
Click here for the Fall 2009 Bookmobile Schedule
30th
Anniversary Open House
The ESLS 30th Anniversary Committee (John Hanson, Nancy Van Voorhis, Joann Wiesner, Linda Bosman, David Weinhold, Darla Jean Kraus, Paula Siefert, Denise Cook) invites you to celebrate thirty years of library service at the Eastern Shores Library System office on Sunday, September 13 from 1:00 - 4:00 p.m.
In April 1977, the Mead Library Board requested funds from the Division for Library Services for a demonstration of county-wide library service. After a successful project year and with the approval of the municipal bodies the Sheboygan County Federated Library Service was established under the direction of the Mead Public Library Director E. R. Kunert.
After a demonstration year in Ozaukee County the system further evolved into the Eastern Shores Library System in 1987. Director Kunert was responsible for both the System and Mead Public Library until his retirement in 1991. At that time the System selected David Weinhold as the new Director of ESLS.
You can learn more ESLS history at the open house. Special guest Larry Nix will display some Library memorabilia from his collection and the staff of Eastern Shores Library System will also be on hand to answer questions.
Joint Library Planning Committee Update
The Joint
County Library Planning Committee has made some additional recommendations
for the 2011-2015 County Library Service Plan.
During its
meetings in July and August, they completed their work on recommendations
for the reimbursement of libraries for serving non-libraried residents and
bookmobile service.
The
Committee discussed the two types of reimbursement formulas being used in
the Library System. Ozaukee
County uses a formula that divides the reimbursement between a factor
related to items loaned to non-libraried residents and a factor that
assigns a ratio to the other library services offered by a library.
The second factor is only used if a library exceeds a threshold
based on the items loaned to non-libraried residents.
Sheboygan County uses the formula that is stated in Wisconsin
Statute 43.12 which
allows the county to reimburse at percentage of a library’s cost to
serve non-libraried residents. The
Sheboygan County method is moving that percentage to 90% at the end of the
current plan in 2010. Ozaukee
County’s method reimburses libraries at either 70% of their costs or 85%
of their costs. Proponents of the Ozaukee County method stated that it
increased the reimbursement for those libraries that provide more loans to
non-libraried residents and also moderated the cost to non-libraried
residents. In response,
opponents stated that the method assigned arbitrary ratios to the other
library services offered by a library.
Proponents of the Sheboygan County method talked about the
simplicity of the formula, the ability of the formula to be easily
modified if the county could not provide the requested reimbursement
level, and the need to move reimbursement to 100% of the library’s cost.
In response, opponents stated
that 100% reimbursement was too great of an amount to fund immediately.
At the end of the discussion, the Committee recommended that the
Counties should work to achieve the 100% reimbursement level based on the
Wisconsin Statue (43.12) formula. Beginning in 2013, the Counties
would reimburse the libraries at the 91% level, at the 92% level in
2014, and the 93% level in 2015.
The
Bookmobile Service was approved by a 60% vote during the November 2008
referendum. The Committee
discussed a proposal that would mitigate the fluctuations in funding for
both counties based on the ratio of use in the counties.
A stable level of funding would make it easier for the counties to
meet the needs of the bookmobile service.
The Committee recommended continuing the bookmobile service and to
assign each county’s share of the funding based on a rolling three
average of each county’s use of the bookmobile service.
The Committee also recommended a method which would allow a county
to add a stop by adding $7500 to the bookmobile funding for the initial
year and then incorporate that funding in the above funding method in
subsequent years. Finally,
the Committee recommended that the Counties set aside funds for the
replacement of the bookmobile vehicle by contributing $25,000 annually to
a vehicle replacement reserve.
The
Committee has reviewed all the elements of a County Library Service Plan
and also completed work on the tasks set forth by each County’s
resolution. In September, the
Committee will be reviewing a draft of a Joint County Library Service Plan
and then offer the draft for public
hearings in October.
Children's
Librarians Corner
Harry Potter Party
Nancy Van Voorhis, Director
Elkhart Lake Public Library
With two more Harry Potter movies coming out I thought I’d share the party the Elkhart Lake Public library had for our middle school summer reading program last year.
We had four tables set up decorated as each of the houses, Gryffindor (lion) in scarlet & gold; Ravenclaw (eagle) in blue & bronze; Slytherin (serpent) in green & silver and Hufflepuff (badger) in yellow and black. We had each of the four colors in the sorting hat and had each participant draw from the hat to determine which house they were in.
Games:
Harry Potter Library Scavenger Hunt
-
Find a Book about a dragon or an owl, write down the title
-
Use a dictionary and find the meaning of the name Hagrid (e)
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Use an encyclopedia to find out the meaning of Fountain of Youth from the Sorcerer’s Stone.
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In Goblet of Fire, 437 items are banned from the school. Name 2 items banned from Hogwarts and 2 items banned from your school.
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Does this library have a biography about author J.K. Rowlings?
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What Harry Potter DVDs are on the shelves in the library right now?
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The “Daily Prophet” is a wizards newspaper mentioned in the books. Name one newspaper this library subscribes to.
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In the children’s book section find a book about an elf, such as Dobby in the books. Write down the title.
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How many “Muggles” are on the Internet computers right now?
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Gringotts, the wizards bank was mentioned in the books. You have been earning library cash for reading this summer. How much library cash would you be able to deposit in Gringotts?
Word Searches: I used Puzzlemaker to create word searches with character names from the book, another one with words from the books.
Crossword Puzzles: Another site I used to find games for our party www.surfnetkids.com/games/harrypotter.
Trivia Games: http://www.kidsreads.com/HP07/content/index.asp
Crafts: We made wands from a sheet of paper rolled up. Hot glued it then decorated it with tissue paper than beads, feathers and whatever else we had left in the supply closets.
Food: Bertie Botts Every Flavor Jelly Beans (while you can go online and buy the
real thing, I used Jelly Belly’s as they were available in my local
store and at a greatly reduced price. The kids imaginations kicked in and
they really thought they had the real thing.
I used the coffee flavor for vomit, popcorn for earwax, juicy pear
for booger and coconut for soap).
Ginger Newts (I used ginger cookies).
Black licorice wands.
Polyjuice Potion (I combined a few different kinds of juice to get a
“fun” color).
Other websites of interest:
http://www.scholastic.com/harrypotter/home.asp
http://www.kidsdomain.com/kids.html Wizard school
LeapFrog Donations
Mercedes Levy, a Plymouth resident recently brought a donation to three libraries in Eastern Shores Library System. Mercedes writes the weblog, Common Sense with Money. She had been contacted by LeapFrog Enterprises, Inc. wanting to donate their Tag and Junior Tag Reading Systems to our libraries. Currently three libraries have accepted the donation: Mead Public Library, Oostburg Public Library and the Bookmobile.
Each library received five Tag readers with cases and three books. The Tag reader is an easy-to-use handheld pen like device. You can touch an icon to hear the story read aloud, or touch a single word to hear the pronunciation. The Tag Junior Pals comes with a case and six books. The Tag Junior books are durable board books with the large Tag Junior book pal for small hands.
Each library will determine if the reading kits will be circulated or used only in the library.
Thank you to Mercedes for thinking of our libraries. Find out more about Mercedes at the Elevenmoms Profile Page. Mercedes also does money-saving presentations.
WAPL 2010 Conference in Sheboygan
The 2010 WAPL conference is scheduled for early May 2010 at the Blue Harbor Conference Center in Sheboygan. Cheryl Becker, WAPL Chair, (South Central Library System) is making appointments to the Conference Planning Committee. If you or members of your library staff would like to be involved in some way -( local arrangements, publicity, registration, hospitality) please contact David Weinhold, Conference Planning Committee Chair, by email or phone 920-208-4900 ext. 312.
Mead Public to Receive Gates Grant
Mead Public Library will be one of the public libraries in the State of Wisconsin to receive funds from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation's Opportunity Online hardware grant program. This program will grant funding to purchase public access PCs.
To be eligible for the the Opportunity Online hardware program a library had to pass two basic eligibility tests. Libraries need to serve a population above 10% poverty or have more than 3,000 people in poverty, based on the 2000 census data and they must have at least some public access PCs more than four years old and must have a sufficient number of PCs as defined by the foundation. This service level eligibility is determined by running the Tech Atlas PC inventory program on each of public access PCs. Eastern Shores Library System evaluated Mead's current public access computers so they could qualify for the grant. ESLS will have to do a follow-up evaluations two more times, in July-September of 2010 and 2011.
According to the DPI's webpage: In this new round of 2009 grants, libraries will be awarded a cash grant to purchase PCs of their choice. Participation in the grant will require matching funds over the two-year time-frame of the grant. The match is 25% the first year (2010) and 50% the second year (2011). Libraries will need to seek matching funds from sources such as their local budget, friends groups, community service clubs, etc. In 2010 Mead Public Library will receive $3,900 from the foundation and will need to have matching funds of $1,300. In 2011 Mead will receive $1,300 and will need to match that dollar for dollar. The total grant money will be $5,200.
For more information on this program go to: http://dpi.wi.gov/pld/gatespcgrant.html .
Interesting Items
* The Beloit College Mindset list for the Class of 2013 now contains: # 4. They have never used a card catalog to find a book and # 34. They have always been able to read books on an electronic screen.
* Higher Education day is September 20, 2009. Check out the website for information and links to various institutions of higher learning and how to finance your education at http://highereducationday.wi.gov/. Locally, Lakeland College will be offering individual visits throughout the day. Contact the admissions office for more details.
* Do you have an employee computer policy? Kim Komando, from the Kim Komando Show has a sample available at her website, check it out at General Computing Policy.
* Kim Komando also has a short quiz for MySpace users, especially the younger generation. Create a link so children and parents know the do's and don't of MySpace.com. Go to http://www.komando.com/myspace/ .
* Check out this site where kids can write and get their own books published : http://tikatok.com/ .
* On September 9, 2009 there will be a repeat webinar about the new functionality in WISCAT’s ILL forms, and other other changes with this latest upgrade. This session will be hosted by Mary Jackson from Auto-Graphics. This will be a repeat of the last webinar for those who could not attend. If you have questions that you would like to ask Mary, feel free to join us again! Contact Denise Cook for more information: 920-208-4900 ext 313 or dcook@esls.lib.wi.us.
* It's on the tip of your tongue but you just can't get it. Try the OneLook Reverse Dictionary. http://www.onelook.com/reverse-dictionary.shtml .
Celebrating at the Luxembourg Fest of Belgium, Wisconsin on August 8, 2009