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For daily ALA and library news, check the American Libraries website or subscribe to our RSS feed.
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In Dewey Decibel Episode 31, “The Haunting of Peoria Public Library,” a special Halloween episode sponsored by Gale, podcast host Phil Morehart road-trips to central Illinois to investigate books flying off the shelves, shadowy figures, and unexplained sounds at Peoria (Ill.) Public Library. Along the way, he enlists the advice of author Mary Roach (Spook: Science Tackles the Afterlife) and paranormal writer John B. Kachuba (Ghosthunting Illinois) and interviews staff at Peoria and Bradley University libraries....
AL: The Scoop, Oct. 26; ALA YouTube channel, Oct. 25 |
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When Skip Prichard (right) opened the 2018 OCLC Americas Regional Council Conference on October 25 in Chicago, the president and CEO of OCLC ran through a list of changes that have occurred in recent years to the ways in which we live and work. “What influences change is control,” he told the more than 200 people attending the two-day meeting in the storied Drake Hotel. As part of the conference theme, “Change the Game,” Prichard talked about five ideas to help bring about organizational change....
AL: The Scoop, Oct. 26 |
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ALA President Loida Garcia-Febo’s Libraries = Strong Communities tour landed in Cranston, Rhode Island, on October 22. The tour is a national advocacy effort that spotlights dynamic library programs that transform lives through education and lifelong learning. Garcia-Febo (right) used the opportunity to recognize the work of school libraries, especially highlighting the library at Cranston High School East for adopting the AASL National School Library Standards for Learners, School Librarians, and School Libraries....
AL: The Scoop, Oct. 26 |
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Timothy Inklebarger writes: “Public libraries across the country are on the front lines of the opioid epidemic, and now they will be eligible to receive a drug that could mean the difference between life and death. Emergent BioSolutions, a biopharmaceutical company headquartered in Gaithersburg, Maryland, announced October 24 that it is offering two free doses of the nasal spray version of the anti-overdose drug Narcan (naloxone hydrochloride) to all 16,568 public library locations in the United States.”...
AL: The Scoop, Oct. 24 |
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On October 24, ALA announced the six books shortlisted for the Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence in Fiction and Nonfiction, awarded for the previous year’s best books written for adult readers and published in the United States. The two medal winners will be announced on January 27, 2019, at the RUSA Book and Media Awards ceremony during the ALA Midwinter Meeting in Seattle....
AL: The Scoop, Oct. 24 |
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Policy changes to the current immigration system are being considered. The proposed changes will have a great impact on communities across the US. Understanding the proposed changes, their impact in our communities, and the resources available that can be shared is essential to providing useful services to immigrant populations. Barriers are increasing for immigrant families who may want to obtain their green cards or who are eligible to naturalize. The proposed changes outlined here ask for public comment....
Reforma, Oct. 25 |
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The Art Institute of Chicago is now offering unrestricted access to thousands of images—44,313 to be exact—from its digital archive. The release is part of the museum’s website redesign and the images have been made available under the Creative Commons Zero license. The Art Institute has also enhanced the image viewing capabilities on the works, allowing them to be seen in far greater detail than before. The Metropolitan Museum of Art made all of its public domain works available online in February 2017....
ArtNet News, Oct. 23; Art Institute of Chicago, Oct. 22 |
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In the spring, PBS compiled a list of 100 beloved books in preparation for its series The Great American Read. After collecting votes from 4 million readers over four months, the most popular books were announced on October 23. Harper Lee’s To Kill A Mockingbird nabbed the top spot, with such classics as Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice, Margaret Mitchell’s Gone with the Wind, Louisa May Alcott’s Little Women, and Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre all in the top 10....
Mental Floss, Apr. 20, Oct. 24; Quartzy, Oct. 23 |
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On October 25, police arrested a man who allegedly tried to steal a Magna Carta from its display at Salisbury Cathedral in the UK. Alarms went off after the suspect used a hammer to smash holes into the glass box that protects the charter. The man was held on suspicion of attempted theft of the document, said to be the best preserved of four original Magna Cartas, the charter of rights granted by King John in 1215 and one of Britain’s most influential legal manuscripts. The version has not been damaged and nobody was injured....
BBC News, Oct. 26 |
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Saroj Ghoting and Pamela Martin-Diaz write: “STEAM in storytime? But of course. Science, technology, engineering, art, and math suffuse all parts of our lives. Once we are knowledgeable about STEAM concepts and how they ‘look’ for infants, toddlers, twos, and preschoolers, we are able to recognize them in our lives, in children’s lives, and in our storytimes. We are then also able to articulate connections between what we do in storytimes and STEAM concepts. Here are some examples.”...
ALSC Blog, Oct. 26 |
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The Kingdom of Hawaiʻi’s first native-language newspaper was published in 1834. By the 1870s, there were 10 such newspapers serving a population with an almost 100% literacy rate—impressive considering that as recently as the early 19th century, Hawaiian was primarily an oral language. Today, tens of thousands of fragile newsprint pages sit in archives and collections around the islands. A group of Hawaiian-language scholars is now working to scan, catalog, and translate this archive....
Atlas Obscura, Aug. 7; Atlas Obscura YouTube channel, Aug. 7 |
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Jennifer Kang writes: “In the spring, Google started rolling out various new features in Gmail, like the Smart Compose, which finishes your sentences as you type, and Nudge, which reminds you when you might need to follow up on an email. By early October, the new version was rolled out to everyone, with no option of switching back. Some of us have grown accustomed to the changes, even embraced them. But others don’t and just want to know how to turn them off. Here’s how, in order of the least annoying to the most annoying.”...
Slate, Oct. 25; The Verge, Apr. 25; G Suite Updates, May 14, Sept. 26; Softonic, June 5 |
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