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#4 Reports A. Activities Report Hedberg Public Library Activity Report August 2009 Adult Services Adult services associate Linda Belknap attended the August Friends Board meeting to report on a successful "first": the opening reception for the June art exhibit featuring one work by each of the artists scheduled to stage solo shows at HPL in the next year. The reception was held in the Program Room, allowing guests and artists to mingle and view art on the nearby art wall. In addition to 50 members of the public, the reception was attended by nine of the artists and two members of the library art committee. Volunteer pianists played the piano donated to the library by Reference/Adult Services department head Mary Buelow. The reception was funded by the Friends. Popular family practice doctor Zorba Paster will kick off the Friends 2010 membership drive. Dr. Paster will speak at 7 p.m. on Thursday, November 12. A Friends-only Meet and Greet/cheese tasting will be held from 6 to 6:30 p.m. Dr. Paster's talk, "How To Live a Long, Sweet Life," is funded by the Friends. It joins eight other free programs listed in the fall adult program series funded by the Nancy Parker Endowment Fund. The series kicks off September 15 with "Ham Radio: Global and Local Opportunities." A full-color brochure describing all nine programs is available in the library information rack. René Bue provided programming at several sites this month. Early in August, she enlightened the members of the Marshall Middle School orchestra camp about Latin American music and musical instruments. That same day, she did a Library Explorers program about chocolate at HPL. The Janesville Police Department invited HPL/René to participate in the National Night Out event; she reported that over 2500 people attended the event. René represented the library at two community events in August. The booth sponsored by ALS at the Rock County 4-H Fair was staffed by ALS librarians/staff throughout the week. Jean and René worked the same shift and tattooed many children while engaging them in conversation about books and reading. Later in the month, René and Mary Buelow represented the library at the Rotary Corn Roast. Jean shared local history information with the Janesville Regency House residents. They enjoyed learning about Janesville notables, including Nellie Tallman and Cordelia Harvey (who was instrumental in improving the conditions for Wisconsin soldiers during the Civil War). The residents of St. Elizabeth’s were surprised to learn about a mystery surrounding Edgar Tallman and his illegitimate (not confirmed but thought to be his) daughter, Ida. Many of the residents reminisced about visits to Monterey Rock and enjoyed the face of the rock photo that Jean shared with them. Next month, the Burr Robbins Circus is one of the topics that will be covered in the program at both sites. The Rock County Literacy Alliance (RCLA) has reconvened and revised their mission to spread the word about literacy in Rock County. The group is promoting literacy by encouraging the ALS libraries to provide space for Scrabble games on International Literacy Day, Tuesday, th September 8 from 2 to 6 p.m. The RCLA members decided to meet quarterly, instead of monthly, due to other responsibilities and commitments. Building Operations The quarterly inspection of the library’s sprinkler system was performed in August. The annual inspection of all 18 fire extinguishers was also done. A major upgrade/remodernization of the staff elevator was done. This process took one week to complete, which meant that all of the normal traffic of staff and book trucks was channeled through Administration and the Ground Floor into the public elevator. Central Services Circulation for the month was up compared to last August. The number of holds filled increased 20%. Playaway audio book’s circulation has improved from last month with fiction more popular than non-fiction works. Over a third of our new registered patrons opted for electronic photos in their accounts. HPL continues to be a net borrower than lender by a narrow gap. Overdrive circulation from ALS libraries has grown an impressive 23% from last August. As HPL enters a slower circulation period due to the end of the summer reading program and the start of the school year, the number of check-ins has out numbers the number of check-outs. Collection Development The bibliography team met to plan new book lists for Fall 2009 and to coordinate their distribution with the preparation of library displays at HPL. Themes for the coming months include “True Adventure,” “Readable Science,” “Teen Mystery,” “Street Lit,” and the updating of such popular lists as “Thrillers” and “Chick Lit”. There will also be a reprint of our most popular list and display of the summer, Beyond Black Tuesday. Clearly, events of the past year have awakened a renewed interest in the Great Depression and its impact on United States’ culture and its people. Collection Manager Carol Kuntzelman and Adult Services Coordinator Jean Yeomans are preparing for a road trip for their mystery book discussion group in coming months. They have selected authors whose works are known as much for their settings as for their detectives, including such well-known authors as James Lee Burke (New Orleans), Robert B. Parker (Boston), and J.A. Jance (Seattle). The series begins September 21 with High Country by Nevada Barr. The setting is beautiful Yosemite National Park and complements both the upcoming PBS series produced by Ken Burns on the national parks and the October Parker program titled “National Parks Wisconsin Style.” August also provided time for Carol Kuntzelman, Jean Yeomans, and Kate Hull to work with Elizabeth Hough and Rebecca Haefner in updating the “For Readers” pages on the HPL Web site. The new site will offer Web sites, blogs, book club information and interactive opportunities of special interest to readers. Human Resources/Accounting The Communication/Training Team met twice in August. In just two one-hour meetings, the team has developed a column for the staff newsletter called “Heads Up”, an intranet database for communication issues called “On the Same Page”, and requested that management team minutes be placed on the staff intranet. Susan Braden received an “I Made a Difference” award for her professional management of a challenging computer class student. Reference Services Total Patron Questions: ? Patron questions asked at Reference Desk – 2817 ? Patron questions asked at Service Desk – 2928 ? Asked at Youth Services 2483 ? Asked at Bilingual Desk (when staffed) 6 ? Asked at Teen Central (when staffed) ? Total patron questions 8469 Reportable Reference Questions: ? Asked at the Reference Desk 1441 ? Asked at Service Desk 271 ? Asked at Youth Services 710 ? Asked at Bilingual Desk (when staffed) ? Asked at Teen Central (when staffed) ? Total for all service points 2488 Statistics from InterLibrary Loan: ? Items requested from other libraries for Hedberg patrons – 531 ? Items received from other libraries for Hedberg patrons – 481 ? Requests received from other libraries to borrow Hedberg materials – 736 ? Items lent to other libraries from the Hedberg collection – 551 Question of the month: Patron wanted to know how many doctors there are in the world. Reference staff found statistics for the number of physicians in the US (884,974) and the number of physicians in selected countries. Reference checked the web site for the World Health organization looking through their databases, statistical tables, and documents. On page 104 of a PDF file titled “World Health Statistics 2009”, Reference found the number of physicians broken down by seven “regions” of the world. Using a calculator, staff totaled the numbers and found there are 8,404,351 doctors in the world. Youth Services Children’s Services Summer programming concluded in August. The final week of storytime was well-attended, with 170 children and adults enjoying these programs. In her capacity as youth services associate, René Bue regaled 40 children with a wonderful bilingual program on chocolate for the last Library Explorers program of the summer. And, once again, the weather proved uncooperative and the Free Family Flick on the Rock became the Free Family Flick in the Program Room – not nearly as exciting. Julie Westby and Camille Rammer attended three webinars on parenting along with other county social services providers. While Julie and Camille felt the information was not always directly applicable to our work at HPL, it was very interesting and offered a new perspective on working with parents at different levels of education and parental expertise. On August 28, HPL Youth Services staff hosted the School District of Janesville library media specialists for lunch and joint training. Megan Schliesman from the Cooperative Children’s Book Center in Madison spoke on determining cultural authenticity in books for children and young adults. It was very nice to be able to spend time with our school colleagues and the discussion about culturally authentic books sparked some interesting conversations. Young Adult Services Indoor Frisbee Golf, trivia contests and discounted prizes were enjoyed by teen participants in the Journey Through Time summer reading Finale. In all, 94 books were given to participants who earned enough reading stamps or to the teen volunteers attending the special Volunteer Recognition and Reception, held the same evening as the teen summer reading Finale. Laurie Bartz joined other HPL staff in greeting visitors at a library information booth staff at the Rotary Corn Roast at Traxler Park. Many high school students were in attendance for Rotary’s “Making the Grade” recognition.