MHLS Annual Meeting

The 49th Annual Meeting of the Mid-Hudson Library System will be held on Friday, October 3rd at the Culinary Institute of America in Hyde Park.

Join us for the continuing education session from 9:00 – 9:30am with Josh, Merribeth & Rebekkah who will be presenting “Ten Easy & Free Ways to Promote Your Library.” At 9:45 the business meeting and awards presentation will begin. Come help elect new trustees to the MHLS Board, recognize staff that have reached milestones in their employment with MHLS and hear about the 2008 Trustee Success Story winners.

Following the business meeting our guest speaker, Charles R. McClure, PhD., will talk about “Libraries & Public Access Computing.” Dr. McClure is the Francis Eppes Professor of Information Studies and Director of the Information Use Management and Policy Institute at the School of Information Studies, Florida State University. Prior to his position at FSU he was a distinguished professor at the School of Information Studies, Syracuse University. Dr. McClure was a principal investigator for the recently released study, “Libraries Connect Communities: Public Library Funding & TechnologyAccess Study 2007-2008.” [http://www.ala.org/plinternetfunding]

Lunch will follow at 11:30am in the Ristorante Caterina de’ Medici.

RSVP’s for the Annual Meeting are due Friday, September 12th with payment for up to three attendees per library. Make sure to coordinate with your trustees and staff. A waiting list will be kept. Questions should be directed to Doris Formby at x10 or dformby@midhudson.org.

MHLS Announcements
Come visit the Mid-Hudson Library System for the System Tour on Wednesday, October 15th from 9:30am – 12:30pm and find out how to make your life easier through the System. The tour introduces member library staff and trustees to the MHLS staff and familiarizes them with available services. The tour will cover:
· An introduction to the MHLS organization, web site and electronic resources (the online library catalog and HOMEACCESS)
· Technology: Automated Services, Data Entry, AV Services, and Computer Operations
· Public Services: Youth Services, ILL, Print Services, Member Information, Outreach & Continuing Education
· Administration: Business Office, Shipping & Delivery
There will also be built-in time to talk one-on-one with department staff. Register now at http://calendar.midhudson.org/

Resource Sharing & Millennium
At the September Director’s Association a number of Millennium issues were dealt with:
· New friendlier text will display for patrons in the online catalog when a hold cannot be placed:
o Sorry, this title is currently unavailable. Contact your library.
· The fines paid file that contains the history of the patron fine and fee activity will be kept for only 12 months. The data will be purged quarterly by MHLS staff to save disk space and to expedite retrieval time in the reporting process.
· The Resource Sharing Standards document will be updated to include the following:
o A scannable barcode must be affixed to all circulating materials.
o Patron registration cards and Millennium patron records must include the full 14-digit barcode.
· A link to the MHLS Patron Privacy Statement has been added to the My Millennium area of the online catalog. Patrons who are logged into their record will see the link displayed amongst the My Millennium options [http://midhudson.org/patronprivacy.htm].


Programming
The August 2008 issue of American Libraries has an article titled Reframing Gaming by Scott Nicholson. Here is a summary of the article that “debunks” misconceptions about gaming in libraries – great to use with staff, trustees and doubting patrons:
#1 Misconception: Gaming in libraries is new activity. Reality: In 1800's, England's public libraries used gaming to lure people from public houses. American libraries have offered chess, Scrabble, bridge and other games throughout 20th century. In 40% of libraries w/formal video gaming, board and traditional games were most popular games used.

#2 Misconception: Only handful of libraries supporting gaming. Reality: 77% of libraries contacted in study were hosting some degree of video gaming--hosting games and allowing Web-based games on public computers.

#3 Misconception: Libraries that support gaming are just becoming arcades. Reality: DDR & Guitar Hero get most pr, but many other types of gaming going on: board games, card (bridge & Pokemon), puzzle games online, educational computer games, role-playing games & historical miniatures. Trick is to match appropriate games to patron age & interest. Gaming creates opportunity for different generations to interact, increasing role of library as hub of community.

Saturday, November 15th is National Gaming Day @your library: “Read, Learn, Play” is the theme. Learn more at: http://www.ilovelibraries.org/gaming/index.cfm

Youth Services
Celebrate Teen Read Week, October 12–18 Thanks in part to events like Teen Read Week, an annual initiative of YALSA, teen books now enjoy unprecedented critical success and popularity. Since 1998, Teen Read Week has encouraged teens to visit their public and school libraries, select their own reading material, and read for the fun of it. This year’s theme is “Books with Bite @ your library,” which promotes a variety of books from vampire stories to cooking to technology (bytes). Learn more at http://www.ala.org/teenread

Congratulations to Beth Zambito, Children's Services Librarian at Poughkeepsie Public Library District, on her election as Secretary of the Youth Services Section (YSS) of the New York Library Association. YSS supports youth services library staff through an annual conference in the spring, sessions at the NYLA conference, a quarterly newsletter and by advocating for children's and teen library issues across the State. Learn more at http://www.nyla.org/index.php?page_id=379

Administration & Management
LAMS is local! Election results for the Library Administration & Management Section (LAMS) of the New York Library Association (NYLA) are in: Rebekkah Smith Aldrich, MHLS Coordinator of Member Information will be the president-elect and Pat Kaufman, director of the Mahopac Library will be the secretary. LAMS is the NYLA section that deals specifically with the concerns of library directors and managers of all types of libraries. Learn more at http://www.nyla.org/index.php?page_id=62

The Small Libraries Roundtable met last month to talk about best practices for working with the board. The group identified the “manger vs. director” perception of trustees as the #1 difficulty and had an excellent discussion about how to manage the board’s perception of them as leaders in the organization. Tips included:
· Be proactive, particularly in your communication with the board president
· Build respect
o Control your response to issues that come up in board meetings, don't just react or be defensive
· "Be the consistency" that may be lacking if there is high turnover on the board. Step up and be the "keeper of the culture" of the board (i.e. how things are done, meeting procedures, schedule of policy review, etc.)
· *Develop an orientation to the library for new trustees
· Mimic the MHLS board meeting procedure of no new agenda items during the meeting. By putting items that come up during a meeting on the next month’s agenda it gives the director an appropriate amount of time to prepare.
· Reevaluate your perception of the board. The board is made of people who, for the most part, are just looking to be a part of something positive for the community - they mean well, it's just not their 24/7 life like it is for the director.

Visit the SMLRT page on the MHLS web site to read more from the meeting, including some great tips for your Director’s Report to the Board at http://midhudson.org/admin/slrt/main.php
*The next meeting of the Small Libraries Roundtable will address Board Development – Recruitment, Orientation & Evaluation on Monday, December 1st from 10-12 at the Heermance Memorial Library in Coxsackie. Register online at http://calendar.midhudson.org/

Member Libraries are welcome to submit items of interest and job openings to the MHLS Bulletin: bulletin@midhudson.org. The MHLS Bulletin is available on line at http://midhudson.org/bulletins/main.htm.