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Tools of the Trade: Empathy, Respect, Openness,
Communications, and the Library Mission

Posted on November 4, 2015
During the time of unrest in Ferguson, we at the Ferguson Municipal Public Library (FMPL) made a conscious decision to simply stay open for our community. We forged many vital relationships during those difficult days by providing empathy, respect, and comfort to the people in our community.

Empathy and Respect – Keeping our doors open during the hard days created a shift in how the people of Ferguson thought of their library. The empathy and respect we showed our patrons created a synergistic boost to the community as a whole.

Understand patrons, and respect them as people. Everything else grows from this, but you have to really mean it. If you care deeply about your community, it shows in every conversation, decision, and service. This cannot be an abstract thing—caring in aggregate but not in specific. It’s about building actual relationships. After all, we serve each patron as a person, individually.

Read moreTools of the Trade: Empathy, Respect, Openness,
Communications, and the Library Mission

Gale Technical Solutions: Think Like a User

Posted on November 4, 2015

By Scott Steward

Welcome back. Last time, I gave you the first tip for organizing your electronic resources: using context. Today, I’d like to help you think like a user.

It doesn’t really matter if your user is a patron, student, teacher, or facility. At the end of the day, they all need to be able to find what they’re looking for, and if they can’t, they’ll go somewhere else. So, let’s make it easier for them.

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Success = Aligning Library Services to Support Community Goals

Posted on November 2, 2015

By Susan H. Hildreth, Executive Director, Califa Group, Pacific Library Partnership, Peninsula Library hildreth4System, and Administrator, NorthNet Library System

I believe that the future relevance and success of the public library is dependent upon the library’s deep knowledge and commitment to community growth and success. Although many libraries have had stated commitments to community priorities, I do not think that we have been disciplined or strategic in effectively deploying the library’s assets to support those priorities. I want to highlight two resources funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation that can provide a framework for integrating community insight into the ongoing program of the library.

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Digital Solutions Promote Pre-K Literacy Development and School Readiness

Posted on November 1, 2015
By Diane M. Sweetwood

Many research studies have shown the positive effects of quality early childhood education on future academic development, educational attainment, and earnings later in life. Yet, 59% of preschool-aged children across the nation—approximately 2.5 million—are not enrolled in publicly funded preschool programs through state preschool, Head Start, and special education preschool services.
Although as many as 30% of three- and four-year olds are fortunate to attend private preschools and child care centers, hundreds of thousands of children have no access to the programs that can help them build literacy skills and prepare them for kindergarten and beyond. The U.S. Department of Education’s 2015 report, “A Matter of Equity: Preschool in America,” notes that “while both states and the federal government invest in early learning, these efforts have fallen short of what is needed to ensure that all children can access a high-quality early education that will prepare them for success.”

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Gale and Google Together for Success

Google for Education Partner

Posted on October 30, 2015

With more than 45 million Google Apps for Education users worldwide and an average of over 40,000 Google search engine queries per second [1], Google is indisputably the place where people get their answers.

As the library seeks to continue to be a valued educational partner in communities, schools, and institutions, bringing trustworthy digital content into the natural path of the student or patron has never been more important. To make it easier for people to find and use this relevant, authoritative information, Gale, a part of Cengage Learning, has partnered with Google for Education in two ways: providing intuitive integration of popular workflow tools through Google Apps for Education and indexing content in Google Scholar.

This new relationship exemplifies Gale’s effort to be a leading provider of educational technology, instructional tools, and content to help our users be successful in school, work, and life.

 

Gale & Google Apps for Education

The ability for students to seamlessly login using Google Account credentials is now available through:

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This Blog Post Is Only for People Interested in Making Money

Posted on October 29, 2015

Note to librarians: This blog post is for you to share! If you have this title, be sure to link it to your GVRL collection. If you don’t have this title and want to learn more, access a free trial today!  

Almost everyone has a “vested” interest in knowing more about money and how to make it work for them. But if it were easy, everyone would be rich.

Former Chairman of the Federal Reserve Alan Greenspan once said, “The number one problem in today’s generation and economy is the lack of financial literacy.”

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Catch a Rising Literary Star

Posted on October 29, 2015

These new authors are creating a buzz

Once upon a time, a young thespian named Will set his quill to paper and wrote a play. The word is, he did pretty well…becoming the most beloved playwright and poet of all time.

A few years later, a sheltered young woman living in the country wrote stories to amuse her family. Ms. Jane Austen also met with great success, we’re told.

Every great author started somewhere – by taking the first step and writing a first work. Today, the literary world is bursting with new talent. And Thorndike can help you bring promising new authors to your power readers – many of whom enjoy reading large print for ease and enhanced comprehension.

Here’s a sampling of first novels by promising new authors now available in large print from Thorndike Press.

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Thorndike Press Staff Recommendation

Posted on October 26, 2015

Thorndike Press wouldn’t be the leading Large Print publisher if it weren’t for our staff. We are passionate about what we do — which is providing the best overall experience we can for our customers and readers. Additionally, at Thorndike Press we put the “V” in voracious when it comes to reading and loving books!

AuthorspicSecret Sisters by Jayne Ann Krentz is the story of two childhood friends, Madeline and Daphne, who experienced a terrifying attack and have done their best to move on with their lives. Madeline runs a chain of luxury hotels and Daphne is a designer. But the secret that they share reunites them as adults and they journey back to a small island off the coast of Seattle, the site of their childhood trauma. Using Nancy Pearl’s Readers Advisory methodology, let me tell you about the doorways that I found most appealing. I was drawn to the character of Madeline, a successful career woman who struggles with intimacy and lost track of her childhood friend.

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