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Kathi Kromer writes: “In its proposed FY2019 budget released February 12, the White House has eliminated funding for the Institute for Museum and Library Services as well as hundreds of millions of dollars dedicated to libraries through the Library Services and Technology Act. The decision echoes the FY2018 proposal, which also eliminated the grant-making agency and its programs. The administration’s budget also calls for elimination or severe cuts to many other federal programs that support libraries, including Innovative Approaches to Literacy.” ALA President Jim Neal issued a statement on the proposal. The budget also eliminates funding for the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, the National Endowment for the Arts, and the National Endowment for the Humanities....
District Dispatch, Feb. 12; Institute of Museum and Library Services, Feb. 12; AL: The Scoop, Feb. 13; The Hill, Feb. 12 |
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On Monday, ALA announced the top books, videos, and audiobooks for children and young adults—including the Caldecott, Coretta Scott King, Newbery, and Printz awards—at the Youth Media Awards ceremony during the ALA Midwinter Meeting in Denver. The winner of the John Newbery Medal was Hello, Universe, by Erin Entrada Kelly; and the winner of the Randolph Caldecott Medal was Wolf in the Snow, illustrated and written by Matthew Cordell. The complete list of winners is posted here....
ALA Public Awareness Office, Feb. 12 |
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Amy Carlton writes: “‘Are libraries neutral? Have they ever been? Should they be?’ asked ALA President Jim Neal during his President’s Program at the ALA Midwinter Meeting in Denver on Sunday. The program featured a sprawling discussion in which multiple definitions of neutrality were proposed, and various positions were argued for and against them. The rhetoric was lively and occasionally prickly on the stage, in the audience, and on social media.” For complete Midwinter Meeting coverage, see the American Libraries Midwinter feed and the #alamw18 Twitter feed....
AL: The Scoop, Feb. 12 |
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Phil Morehart writes: “Junot Díaz (right), author of The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao and the upcoming kids’ picture book Islandborn, delivered a love letter to libraries when he addressed a capacity crowd as an Auditorium Speaker on Sunday. The talk was boisterous and effusive with praise and gratitude, but also contained much tough love as Díaz held the profession’s feet to the fire on many issues.” Watch an excerpt (2:35)....
AL: The Scoop, Feb. 11; ALA YouTube channel, Feb. 11 |
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Amy Carlton writes: “Artist, activist, and author Patrisse Cullors began the Opening General Session on Friday by telling a story about her 4th-grade teacher. Cullors is one of the cofounders of Black Lives Matter and author of When They Call You a Terrorist: A Black Lives Matter Memoir. Teaching children that they are made of magic, made of love, she said, is the work of democracy. Cullors was interviewed onstage by another young activist, Marley Dias, the 13-year-old creator of the #1000BlackGirlBooks campaign.” Watch an excerpt (1:23)....
AL: The Scoop, Feb. 11; American Libraries Trend, Nov. 1, 2016; ALA YouTube channel, Feb. 10 |
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“Although I was always a reader, I think I was a writer first,” poet and author Elizabeth Acevedo (right) told attendees at Saturday’s Arthur Curley Memorial Lecture. “I grew up in a house of storytellers.” Acevedo credited her parents, who emigrated to New York City from the Dominican Republic in the 1970s, with her love of literature. Acevedo is the author of two poetry collections and a novel in verse, The Poet X (published in March by HarperTeen), from which she read an excerpt. Watch the interview video (1:52)....
AL: The Scoop, Feb. 11; ALA YouTube channel, Feb. 10 |
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Miranda Doran-Myers writes: “Societal shifts happen so often and so quickly that it can be difficult for public libraries to develop library programming that will meet the needs of their patrons in the future. Two staff members from the Denver Public Library, Viviana Casillas, a program administrator, and Yanira Duarte, the Summer of Learning program coordinator, shared how their library is responding to the needs of their changing community.”...
AL: The Scoop, Feb. 12 |
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Terra Dankowski writes: “What can a library do when a user’s viewing of pornographic images offends another user? How should a library respond when a patron says that an educational program on the Hindu celebration of Diwali represented religious proselytizing and caused him emotional harm? What steps should a library take when a visitor violates the code of conduct because of behavior stemming from mental illness? PLA’s ‘Legal Issues in Public Libraries Forum,’ moderated by Tomas Lipinski (right), dean of the School of Information Studies at the University of Wisconsin Milwaukee, took a look at these questions on Sunday.”...
AL: The Scoop, Feb. 11 |
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Phil Morehart writes: “To fine or not to fine? The question divides the library community. In ‘Fine Free Future’ on Saturday, three librarians waded into the argument to advocate for the elimination of fines for overdue materials and to advise librarians on how to make a case to administrators and community members who may be opposed to the idea.”...
AL: The Scoop, Feb. 11
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ALA has chosen Manhattan Beach (Scribner) by Jennifer Egan as the winner of the 2018 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Fiction, and You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me: A Memoir (Little, Brown) by Sherman Alexie as the winner of the 2018 Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction. The selections were announced February 11 at the RUSA Book and Media Awards....
AL: The Scoop, Feb. 11 |
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George M. Eberhart writes: “The ProQuest breakfast on Saturday morning featured the information-content company’s director of security and privacy information, Dan Ayala, who briefed attendees on two European Union privacy laws that will take effect on May 25: the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the ePrivacy Directive. Any American firm doing business in Europe will be affected by this legislation, Ayala said, and they are already ‘forcing US companies to look at data privacy in completely different ways.’”...
AL: The Scoop, Feb. 10 |
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The RUSA Library Services to an Aging Population Committee met on Sunday morning at the ALA Midwinter Meeting in Denver. Some of the new resources under discussion were: RUSA Guidelines for Library Services with 60+ Audience (2017), ODLOS Keys to Engaging Older Adults @ your library (2017), ASCLA Interest Group on Alzheimer’s and Related Dementias Review of Related Standards, the Powerful Tools for Caregivers curriculum, the Population Reference Bureau’s Aging in the United States report, and the Brookdale Foundation’s National Group Respite Program....
Reference and User Services Association |
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New research is rewriting the history of the world’s most famous early medieval manuscript—a lavishly illustrated 1,200-year-old copy of the Gospels known today as the Book of Kells. A detailed analysis of the texts has led a leading expert on early medieval illuminated manuscripts, Bernard Meehan of Trinity College, Dublin, to conclude that the book was originally two separate works that were created up to 50 years apart....
The Independent (UK), Feb. 7 |
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Twice a month, a dog named Sting visits the White Bear Lake branch of the Ramsey County (Minn.) Library so that young kids can read to him as part of a program called Paws to Read. He’s participated for the last two years. Sting’s visits usually last about an hour, during which time three kids get 20 minutes each with him. But one week recently, no one showed up, so his owner put photos of him on Facebook looking sad and forlorn. Sting is now all booked up....
Today, Feb. 12 |
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