Contents
U.S. & World News
ALA News
Booklist Online
D.C. Update
Division News
Awards
Seen Online
Tech Talk
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Three states and feds pursue social networking controls
Legislators in Illinois, Georgia, and North Carolina have drafted bills that would restrict access by children and teens to such websites as MySpace and Facebook, while the U.S. Senate is again considering a law that jeopardizes e-rate funding for libraries that do not limit minors’ use of social networking sites—a replay of the Deleting Online Predators Act (DOPA) of 2006, which passed the House by 410–15 in July 2006 but died in the Senate....

Presidential libraries combine archives online
Twelve presidential libraries spanning the Herbert Hoover to Bill Clinton administrations have teamed up to create the Presidential Timeline of the 20th Century, a multimedia online archive launched February 15. Spearheaded by the Lyndon Baines Johnson Library and Museum in Austin, Texas, the collaborative effort presents interactive timelines of each president’s life that include documents, diaries, maps, photo galleries, audio recordings, video clips, and classroom projects for teachers....

Providence may sell historic downtown library
Facing financial pressures that have resulted in layoffs, cuts in operating hours, and threatened branch closings, the Providence (R.I.) Public Library is considering selling its historic downtown Central Library facility. The 107-year-old, 115,000-square-foot building, which is on the National Register of Historic Places, was valued by the city at $16 million in the late 1990s; since then, the downtown area has enjoyed a building boom....

Washington Office presents its first Second Life lecture
On February 15, David Lankes of Syracuse University delivered the ALA Washington Office’s first interactive presentation in Second Life, entitled “Participatory Networks: Libraries as Conversation.” Since the presentation was based on a technology brief written for the Office for Information Technology Policy on social networking software, Second Life proved to be a fantastic venue to engage librarians in a conversation about the paper....
District Dispatch blog, Feb. 16

American Libraries presents Julie Andrews
In a special Annual Conference program celebrating the magazine’s centennial, American Libraries presents Julie Andrews, star of the films Mary Poppins and The Sound of Music and the Broadway musicals My Fair Lady and Camelot. She published her first children’s book, Mandy, in 1971 and as Julie Andrews Edwards she and her daughter Emma Walton Hamilton recently published a series of books, including The Great American Mousical, from HarperCollins. The event will take place Monday, June 25, 10:30 a.m. to noon....

Record number of libraries receive “Let’s Talk About It” grants
The ALA Public Programs Office and Nextbook, a gateway to Jewish literature, culture and ideas, selected 95 public and academic libraries in 31 states to receive grants for Let’s Talk About It: Jewish Literature programs. This is the largest number of “Let’s Talk About It” grants ever awarded under a single application deadline....

New CPLA courses and candidates approved
The Certified Public Library Administrator Program Certification Review Committee approved 28 candidates and eight more program courses at the 2007 ALA Midwinter Meeting in Seattle. The program is a voluntary post-MLS certification program for public librarians with three years or more of supervisory experience and ALA-accredited master’s degrees in library and information studies....

COA announces accreditation actions
The Committee on Accreditation has continued the accreditation of LIS graduate programs for the University of British Columbia, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and the University of Washington....

You know where your money goes...
See where it came from on a visit to the U.S. Bureau of Engraving and Printing during ALA Annual Conference, June 21–27. You'll see millions of dollars printed during a tour of the BEP. The tour features the various steps of currency production, beginning with large, blank sheets of paper, and ending with wallet-ready bills. Free, same-day tickets are required for all tours on a first-come, first-served basis. The ticket booth on Raoul Wallenberg Place opens at 8:00 a.m. Monday through Friday and closes when all tickets have been distributed (usually by 9 a.m.)....

Elizabeth Edwards to keynote PLA President’s program
Elizabeth Edwards, a passionate advocate for children and families and the wife of 2008 presidential candidate John Edwards, will deliver the keynote address to the PLA President’s Program and Awards Presentation June 25 at ALA Annual Conference in the Washington, D.C., Convention Center....

ALCTS poster session proposals
ALCTS seeks proposals for a poster session to be held during its 50th Anniversary Conference, June 20–21, in Washington, D.C. The conference theme, “Interactive Futures: A National Conference on the Transformation of Library Collections & Technical Services,” will engage attendees in a thought-provoking, open, and participatory exchange on the transformation of our work and our profession....

ALCTS 2007 preconferences
On June 21–22, ALCTS will offer two two-day workshops in the continuing series on basic cataloging from ALCTS and the Program for Cooperative Cataloging: “Fundamentals of Library of Congress Classification” and “Comprehensive Series Training.”...

New ALA scholarship named after Cicely Phippen Marks
ALA has established a new scholarship to help support the education of a student enrolled in an ALA-accredited LIS master’s degree program who has an interest in working in a federal library. Named in honor of the late Cicely Phippen Marks, who died in July 2006, and supported by a generous donation from her husband Charles L. Garris, the annual award of $1,500 will be sponsored by the Federal and Armed Forces Round Table. When she retired because of her health in 2004, Marks was working at the U.S. Customs and Border Protection library....

Notable computer software for children
ALSC has selected its 2007 list of Notable Computer Software and Online Subscription Services for children. The list identifies high-quality computer programs and online subscription services for children 14 years of age and younger....

RUSA Emerald Research Grant deadline extended
RUSA is extending the submission deadline for its Emerald Research Grant Award to April 15. The award is sponsored by the Emerald Group Publishing Limited and presented by RUSA’s Business Reference and Services Section....

Improving Literacy Through School Libraries grants
Applications are due April 2 for these Department of Education program grants. Eligible applicants include local education agencies (LEAs) in which at least 20% of the students served are from families with incomes below the poverty line based on the most recent data from the U.S. Census Bureau. Approximately $19 million will be available for funding, and an estimated 100 grants will be awarded under this competition....
U.S. Department of Education

Staples Foundation grants
Libraries might be interested in applying for Staples Foundation for Learning grants, which help fund nonprofit programs that provide job skills or education to everyone, with a special emphasis on disadvantaged youth. Applications for the next round of grants are due April 6....
Staples Foundation for Learning

Gay-rights pioneer Barbara Gittings dies
Barbara Gittings, 75, leader in the fight for gay rights, died February 18 in Kennett Square, Pennsylvania, after a seven-year struggle with breast cancer. Gittings had served as head of the ALA Gay Task Force and in 2003 was presented with an ALA Honorary Membership, the Association’s highest honor. Involved with gay rights since the 1950s, Gittings helped organize Philadelphia’s first gay civil rights demonstration in 1965 and its first gay pride parade in 1972....
Philadelphia Inquirer, Feb. 20

With one word, children’s book sets off a media uproar
The word “scrotum” does not often appear in polite conversation. Or children’s literature, for that matter. Yet there it is on the first page of The Higher Power of Lucky, by Susan Patron, this year’s winner of the Newbery Medal. The book’s heroine hears the word when another character says he saw a rattlesnake bite his dog, Roy, on the scrotum. But Gelf Magazine points out that youth literature is filled with scrotums, librarian/author Susan Patron responds that she “was interested in creating authentic characters who would ring true for readers,” and Authors Supporting Intellectual Freedom sarcastically admit, “We sit there at our computers, looking for places to sneak in those touchy words, just so we can shock shock! unsuspecting librarians.”...
New York Times, Gelf, Publisher’s Weekly, AS IF! blog, Feb. 15–19

Bill could stimulate library donations
Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Sen. Bob Bennett (R-Utah) have reintroduced for the fourth time legislation that would encourage artists to donate their works to libraries and museums. The Artist-Museum Partnership Act (PDF file) would allow artists, writers, and composers to take a tax deduction equal to the fair market value of the works they donate to U.S. public institutions. Under current law, they can only deduct the value of supplies....
Senator Patrick Leahy, Feb. 12

Muskogee library program keeps global tradition
Muskogee (Okla.) Public Library directors and board members have come and gone, but one thing that has stayed the same for the past 31 years is the Great Decisions program and Don Betz. The library’s Great Decisions is believed to be the longest-running program in the state that invites experts to speak on global topics. Betz, a Middle East expert and now chancellor at the University of Wisconsin at River Falls, is credited for the longevity of the series, in which speakers focus on a particular area of the world....
Tulsa (Okla.) World, Feb. 19

Tennessee library missing from state budget
A proposed $48-million new library for the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga is not included in Gov. Phil Bredesen’s 2007–08 budget recommendations, administration officials said February 19. While there are some $190.2 million in higher education projects in the budget, the proposed replacement for UTC’s Lupton Library is not there....
Chattanooga (Tenn.) Times Free Press, Feb. 20

Black women having their say
A Newark Public Library exhibit (PDF file) for Black History Month features more than 100 African-American women authors from New Jersey. Few are big names in the literary world. One owned a cosmetics company; two wrote textbooks for Islamic children in Jersey City; another was a 1949 Newark politician who owned a Swedish massage parlor. If it hadn’t been for curator Sibyl E. Moses, their work would have been lost. The exhibit runs through March 3....
Newark (N.J.) Star-Ledger, Feb. 2

High school student pleads for library funding
A Fairfield Area (Pa.) High School junior asked the school board this week not to slash funds from the school library in the 2007–08 budget. Kayla Miller told the school board many of the library’s books are out of date, and “it’s often very hard (to do projects) if we can’t find what we need.” The preliminary budget the board approved February 12 includes only $100 for the purchase of new books, a reduction of about $11,000 from 2006–07....
Hanover (Pa.) Evening Sun, Feb. 17

Library posters an ethical gray area in New York
If and when the New York Senate, as its leaders have promised, adopts the ethics bill unanimously passed in the Assembly in mid-February, will the New York Library Association have to stop handing out those “Read” posters that feature nearly life-size photos of state legislators? The proposed new law bans all lobbying gifts except those of nominal value....
Albany (N.Y.) Times-Union, Feb. 19

Philadelphia branch closed by flood
The Independence branch of the Free Library of Philadelphia will be closed several weeks due to a sprinkler pipe that burst February 11 and soaked carpeting in the main reading room. Two earlier floods caused by burst pipes during renovations last summer damaged a unique collection of gay and lesbian civil-rights books donated by the late Barbara Gittings....
Philadelphia Inquirer, Feb. 20

Post–Civil War papers find permanent home
A suitcase documenting the life of a Confederate officer was shuttled between attics and basements for decades, the papers inside becoming fragile and yellow, closer to peril with each passing year. After years in transit, the postwar papers of Lt. Col. Benjamin Franklin Eshleman are now in the public domain, preserved indefinitely inside the climate-controlled rare-books vault at the University of South Carolina Beaufort South Campus, thanks to a recent donation....
Beaufort (S.C.) Gazette, Feb. 14

Student library sit-in in defense of mosques
For more than three weeks, 200 female students from the Jamia Hafsa Islamic seminary, veiled in black and armed with sticks, have staged a sit-in at a nearby children’s library in Islamabad, Pakistan, to protest the government’s demolition of two illegally built mosques. The students occupied the library by force, making a temporary rooftop bridge from their own building, and then climbing in, but the government has balked at using force to break up the demonstration....
New York Times, Feb. 21

Tips on creating a podcast
On December 7, 2006, the ALA Washington Office debuted the District Dispatch Podcast, a regularly updated audio program containing news and commentary about library-related legislation. Many people have asked them how to create a podcast, so they have responded by offering a step-by-step podcasting guide....
District Dispatch blog, Feb. 14

Launching IM reference at Binghamton University
Binghamton University libraries implemented an IM reference service using the Trillian client to monitor multiple IM accounts at two distinct reference service points. This paper by Elizabeth Brown, Sarah Maximiek, and Erin E. Rushton addresses the process and practical considerations of implementing the service including selection of the appropriate software, creation of IM accounts for each service, development of a staffing schedule, and training of reference staff....
College and Undergraduate Libraries (2006)

Open letter to ILS vendors
Roy Tennant offers some trend-watching tips to vendors of integrated library systems in this open letter, which also refers to a November 2006 article in Business Week on Eastman Kodak adapting to the digital-camera market....
TechEssence.Info blog, Feb. 15

The new academic library professional (subscription required)
If you work in an academic library and are under 35, you probably don’t have a lot in common with your older counterparts. You are far more likely to work in areas beyond the confines of traditional librarianship, often in information technology. You are less likely to hold a degree in library science. You are more diverse in ethnic and racial terms. And while those of you in nonsupervisory jobs generally earn less than your comparable older colleagues, some of you in high-tech jobs earn much more....
Chronicle of Higher Education, Feb. 23

Joint statement on censorship and science
A hearing held on January 30 by the House of Representatives Committee on Oversight and Government Reform revealed a widespread pattern of political interference in the operations of federal scientific activities, including censorship of federal scientists’ speech and writing, the distortion and suppression of research results, and retaliation against those who protest these acts. This statement, endorsed by the ALA and the National Coalition Against Censorship, identifies the issues at stake....
National Coalition Against Censorship, Feb. 6

Colorado CE opportunities on LEO
Since November, librarians in Colorado have been able to find continuing education opportunities through the LEO online database. Maintained by the Colorado Library Consortium and developed by the Quipu Group of Wheat Ridge, Colorado, the database is browsable by date, organization, and topic....
Colorado Library Consortium

Do you know a Griot?
StoryCorps Griot is a one-year initiative, funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, to collect interviews from some 1,750 African Americans. From February 15, 2007, through February 28, 2008, the project will make stops in nine locations, partnering with radio stations, historically black colleges and universities, and other cultural institutions and membership organizations, to record and distribute the stories. The tour is in Atlanta until March 24 and in Newark from March 29 to May 5....
StoryCorps, Feb. 7

The underrepresented Native American LIS student
Emporia State University student Monique Lloyd describes how Native Americans are underrepresented in the field of library science, the possible causes behind this imbalance, and programs designed to recruit American Indians and other minority groups....
Library Student Journal 2, no. 1 (Feb.)

New WorldCat Registry
The WorldCat Registry is a web-based directory for libraries and library consortia that serves as an authoritative single source for information defining institutional identity, services, relationships, contacts, and other key data. People with whom you formerly shared information using a variety of methods—internet, fax, phone, paper—can now retrieve the data themselves through the registry....
OCLC WorldCat

Oral histories of U.S. diplomats
A new online collection of interviews with some of the most prominent diplomats of the 20th century debuted February 21 on the Library of Congress website. “Frontline Diplomacy,” the foreign affairs oral history collection of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training, captures diplomats’ experiences, motivations, critiques, personal analyses, and private thoughts....
Library of Congress, Feb. 21

Academic Freedom Center established at NYU
A new center for the study of academic freedom has been established at New York University’s Division of Libraries. The Frederic Ewen Academic Center will sponsor scholarly research and public programs to raise awareness of threats to intellectual freedom. Funded by a major gift from Herbert Kurz, chairman of the board of the Presidential Life Insurance Company, the center is housed at NYU’s Tamiment Library, an archive devoted to research on labor history and the history of other progressive political movements....
New York University, Feb. 13

Jump to light speed: Star Wars turns 30 in May
To tie in with the 30th Anniversary of Star Wars, Random House has created a free event kit to help booksellers and librarians offer something special. If you sign up for an event, you will receive a Star Wars 30th anniversary event box that includes a commemorative poster, a list of activity ideas, and Yoda “Read, you will” pins....
Random House/Del Rey

Highlights from week one of Five Weeks to a Social Library
In the first week of the free online course Five Weeks to a Social Library, participants focused on blogs and heard some amazing presentations from academic librarians, a public librarian, a special librarian, and a fresh-out-of-library-school librarian (all of which are available). Meredith Farkas has some extracts of participants’ blog posts that she found particularly insightful....
Information Wants to Be Free blog, Feb. 18

Gail Borden Public Library’s Storypalooza
The Gail Borden Public Library District in Elgin, Illinois, is using YouTube to help them tell stories about the library and reading. In January and February, they asked library users to pick up their cameras and upload videos about their favorite books or community activities. Now that the deadline has passed, they are asking everyone to vote for their favorites....
Gail Borden Public Library District

Love in the stacks: The Britannica 2007 yearbook entry on “Libraries”
American Libraries Senior Editor George Eberhart contributed the entry on “Libraries” to the 2007 Britannica Book of the Year. It’s available in slightly edited form on the Britannica blog, timed for release on Valentine’s Day because of the news about Belgian bib-dating, the British “Love Libraries” campaign, and the Dutch “We miss you!” marketing award....
Britannica blog, Feb. 14

Three Maine college libraries to collaborate on model program
Colby, Bates, and Bowdoin colleges have received a $280,000 grant from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to build a model collaborative library collection development program. The plan is to share collection resources in all formats, electronic and print, reduce unnecessary duplication and redundant purchases, and make a broader universe of materials available at each campus....
Bowdoin College, Jan. 3

Suffering from Buffy withdrawal?
Fans of the former TV series Buffy the Vampire Slayer can recreate the Sunnydale High School library as a display center for their favorite action figures. As the promo says, “With an occult section larger than the Smithsonian’s, the Sunnydale High School Library served as Buffy’s not-so-secret headquarters for three years. Whether serving as Research Central or being blown up to stop the Mayor, the library playset is an intricately designed reproduction of the classic two-level design.”...
Toynk.com

E-books for French people with disabilities
French digital librarian Alain Patez writes that since 2001, he and other librarians at the Landowski multimedia library of Boulogne-Billancourt in the western suburbs of Paris have been doing fieldwork in the area of digital reading by quadriplegics. In partnership with Numilog, they created a Digital Library for Disabled Persons in January 2006 for the town....
Tele-Read blog, Feb. 17

Science-fiction author bookplates
Bookplate blogger Lewis Jaffe offers a selection of bookplates used by famous sf authors from Edgar Rice Burroughs and H. P. Lovecraft to John Brunner and Arthur C. Clarke. Of the bookplate pictured here, he writes: “Harlan Ellison uses a bookplate printed at Gnome press from a design by Ed Cartier. The late Andre Norton used a similar bookplate.”...
Confessions of a Bookplate Junkie, Feb. 3

UK town funds new school library for Sri Lanka
A school in a tsunami-ravaged area of Sri Lanka is to get a brand new library, thanks to the mayor of Stevenage’s fundraising appeal. Shums Central College in Maruthamunai was one of 15 schools on Sri Lanka’s east coast to be completely destroyed by the December 2004 tsunami. The Mayor’s Tsunami Appeal has provided £2,500 ($4,890 U.S.) to the project so far and will soon donate another £2,500 to complete it....
Stevenage (U.K.) Council, Jan. 26

Reasons to love your library
The New Jersey State Library compiled this video (1:37) of users explaining why they love their public library, such as: “They know the kind of books I like, I find things I didn’t even know I needed or wanted, [and] I couldn’t fit everything I like to read and listen to in my personal library.”...
New Jersey State Library, Feb. 12

British Library improves website
The British Library’s new home page incorporates an improved search engine that can simultaneously query its web pages, its entire catalogue, 90,000 pictures and sounds from the Collect Britain website, and 9 million articles from 20,000 journals on British Library Direct....
British Library

Strange book titles in Topeka
The Topeka and Shawnee County (Kans.) Public Library lists on its blog a few odd book titles in the library’s collection, among them Forbidden Fruit Creates Many Jams by Mary Katherine and David Compton and Island of the Sequined Love Nun by Christopher Moore....
PaperCuts blog, Feb. 17