Keeping Pace in Your Career (and Life) with Gale Courses

| By Mary Kelly and Holly Hibner |

Personal and professional development is one of the least-served but most important aspects of anyone’s job. This is especially true in the world of libraries. Serving library patrons depends on library staff being up-to-date in a variety of subjects. Ask any librarian out there on the front lines of service and all will agree that keeping up to date in everything from technology to the latest best seller is essential!

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Understanding Community Goals Leads to Success for Libraries and Communities – A post from the 2016 Library of the Year

By Leah Sewell, Communications Editor, Topeka & Shawnee County Public Library

Have you ever been on the other line of a survey call? I haven’t, personally, but I’ve often wondered if I would be a willing participant. Perhaps in the midst of a particularly juicy book, soaking up one-on-one time with my fast-growing 9-year-old or closely watching a new recipe simmer, what would compel me to answer the phone, but also to converse with a researcher for an indeterminate spell? Well, for one thing, I’d pretty much drop everything and let dinner burn to gab with any stranger, on the phone or otherwise, when the topic is libraries.

You see, in my career as the Topeka and Shawnee County Public Library’s Communication Editor, I am enamored with the “public” part of the public library. How does the public feel about our services? How will they react to a minor or a major change? How can we woo them, engage them, help them feel a part the community through literacy and learning, and subsequently change their lives for the better?

My library is focused on the public and the public good. It’s asking the right questions, discovering people’s goals and needs and assisting them so they can reach them. Ultimately, it’s about making a difference in the community by working with our fellow citizens to make their lives better. That’s a good chunk of the reason why we’re the Library Journal / Gale, a part Cengage Learning 2016 Library of the Year. We have our ears to the ground.

When the 2016 Pew Research Center report, Libraries at the Crossroads, was released in September 2015, I wondered about the people on the other end of those cell phones and land lines. Those individuals that Pew cites variously as “a share of Americans” or “a majority of Americans,” or “low-income Americans” are real individuals with busy lives, loved ones and their own dinners to prepare. Yet, they all sat a spell to gab about libraries.

Read moreUnderstanding Community Goals Leads to Success for Libraries and Communities – A post from the 2016 Library of the Year

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 thingcaring 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

Life Coach, Anyone? Self-Guided, Online Support for Better Living

Life and Career Skills eBooks for young adults

Achieving personal and professional excellence doesn’t “just happen” for most people. Success typically results from persistence and guidance.  For some, turning to a life coach is useful – receiving personal assistance with decision-making and skills acquisition. But with rates averaging $100 to $300 per hour, that service is out of reach for most young adults.

But hiring a professional isn’t the only path. With new resources from Gale, those eager for coaching can find help at the library.  (In fact, at YOUR library!)

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5 Ways to Increase Gale Courses Traffic Online from Greene County Public Library

By Anne Nagrant, Customer Success Manager

Posted on August 26, 2015

Greene County Public Library in Ohio recently renewed their annual subscription to Gale Courses –online, instructor-led classes which are free to library cardholders. Tamar Kreke, Adult and Technical Services Coordinator, shares five things her library does to recruit students to the resource:

  • Gale Courses is posted on their website under Digital Collections instead of the “Research” page where databases are listed. Tamar knows that Greene County patrons are already going to Overdrive, Zinio, and Mango, so she feels that people are more likely to come across Gale Courses in the same area where these other high-trafficked products are found. The library also created its own landing page about Gale Courses, with a description and more information about it.

Read more5 Ways to Increase Gale Courses Traffic Online from Greene County Public Library

Another Take on Summer Reading and Gale Resources

By Tanisha Howard-Hall

As a Customer Success Manager, I’m always eager to see what types of programing and promotions public libraries have going on. Summer reading is no exception!

For Teens

Brentwood Public Library in Tennessee is offering ACT Boot Camps for teens this summer! The boot camp gives a jump start

Read moreAnother Take on Summer Reading and Gale Resources

Summer Reading Programs and Your Gale Resources

By Anne Nagrant and Vanessa Craig

Summer and reading go hand in hand. From books for the beach to bestselling paperbacks, adults take advantage of longer days and vacation time. Children are encouraged to read for fun and to combat the “summer slide.” Public library summer reading programs provide fun motivation for both adults and young people to read, read, read.

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Complement Your May Programing with Product-Related Posts

By Gale Customer Care

It’s always fun to find and share obscure holidays. You never really know what you could be celebrating before you do a little research. And what better place to research than the library!

We encourage you to have a little fun with some lesser known holidays in month of May and give a sneak peek of eResources while you’re at it.

We’ve got equal parts National Geographic Virtual Library and Artemis Literary Sources to post on social media or share in your newsletter. Please feel free to pick and choose and use the images and copy provided below… or use it as inspiration. Show your followers what you have to offer in your digital collections and tell them how to access.

May 1: Mother Goose Day

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Who Are Your Patrons? Where Are They Coming From? And What Branches Do They Visit?  

Public Library Branch Insights and User Visits and Demographics

Patrons at your main branch mostly hail from all over town, but patrons at your eastside branch come from within just a few blocks away. Or do they?? Do you know how far people travel to get to a particular location? And, if you did know, how might it change your collection and outreach programs?

Branch Insights, a new Analytics On Demand app, tracks cardholders’ use across various branches in a single library system. With this information presented in maps and tables, you can gain insight into where and how individual patron types are engaging the library system so you can tailor materials, programs, services, and outreach to meet patron needs at each library site.

Read moreWho Are Your Patrons? Where Are They Coming From? And What Branches Do They Visit?  

Whipping Up the Right Mix of Cooking Resources

Sushi.  Cupcakes.  Acai.  Paleo.  Kale.  Hot food trends never end.  And neither do peoples’ interests in cooking for their friends and family.  But many want to look beyond Pinterest and popular websites to learn new skills and take a fresh look at culinary arts.

Members of your community are hungry for resources to help them develop their cooking skills and repertoire.

Read moreWhipping Up the Right Mix of Cooking Resources