YART Spring Meeting Review

Patty Birch of North Platte High School gave a great presentation on collection development. Saying that teens are like jellyfish, Patty told us young adults may act like they don’t know what’s going on but they are always learning and listening and our role as librarians is to help guide them in what they read.

Patty talked about making sure your selection criteria is in place as well as keeping up with series. She also talked about making sure you have a policy for donations/gifts to your library - making it clear that you welcome donations but will only use what you can. Patty also talked about collaborating with teachers about topics or reading requirements they will assign to their students throughout the year.

She then gave us a list of Top 10 blogs she follows for book reviews and collection development ideas. These and other resources can be found at delicious.com/nlayart. Patty's presentation led the way for some excellent discussion among those in attendance.

Then, Melanie Feyerherm Schultz, YART secretary, discussed the BWI/YALSA Collection Development Grant she received for Baright Public Library (Ralston, NE) in 2011. She talked about how she wrote the grant, detailing what she said she would do with the resources, how she involved the middle and high school book clubs in the selection of books and how successful it was to expand the library's YA collection.
 
Other grants and funding opportunities were discussed which can also be found on YART's Delicious page through the "collection development grant" tag.  A suggestion was to note on a calendar all the different deadlines for grants that pertain to your school or public library to make sure you're aware of when you should be working on them.

Scholastic book fairs at the middle and high school levels were another possibility for funding.
Jake Rundle, YART chair, also discussed Junior Library Guild books that you can subscribe to. This resource will send you a book each month for each reading level you subscribe to.

Then Sally Snyder, of the Nebraska Library Commission presented book talks of “Best Genre Books to Build Your Collection.” The handout of books she discussed is available by clicking here. and the audio of the presentation is now available here. There are some fantastic suggestions in there so be sure to take a look and listen. 

Thanks again to all of our presenters and our attendees. We hope you enjoyed the Spring Meeting!

April 14 Spring Meeting Registration Now Open

Saturday, April 14th

Gothenburg Public Library

1104 Lake Avenue Gothenburg, NE 69138

1 p.m. – 4 p.m.

YART’s Spring Meeting will focus on collection development!

Agenda

1. Collection Development Workshop: What makes a collection good, how can school and
public librarians work together, weeding—it’s all here! Guest Presenter: Patty Birch, North
Platte High School.
2. Funding Your Collection: Learn about grants, how to stretch your budget, book fairs, and
more. Presented by YART members.
3. Best Genre Books to Build Your Collection: Sally Snyder of the Nebraska Library
Commission will be doing a booktalk via Skype.

Optional lunch from 12 p.m. – 1 p.m. with YART board. Tell us what you want out of YART.

Door prizes courtesy of Republican Valley Library System and Meridian Library System. Meeting co-sponsored by SCYP.

Cost: $10 ($5 if you bring an example of an Awful Library Book that needs to be weeded!)

Please download the registration form below and return by April 9th.

YART Spring Meeting Registration Form

YART - Now on Facebook and Twitter

Calling all social media savvy YARTers!

You can now find YART on Facebook (facebook.com/nlayart) and Twitter (twitter.com/nlayart).

Please follow us and share you thoughts and ideas so that we can all grow together as librarians serving young adults!

YART Fall 2011 Business Meeting Minutes

Young Adult Round Table Business Meeting

NLA Conference - October 6, 2011 4:30 p.m.

Cornhusker Marriott - Lincoln, NE

1. New Leadership
Gordon Wyant outgoing president announced the new board - Jake Rundle/chair, Lindsey Tomsu/vice chair, and Melanie Feyerherm Schultz/secretary.

2. Financial Report
Gordon provided the financial report stating YART has a profit of $281.83. Last year’s profit came from NLA section allocations, registration fees for the spring meeting, support from SCYP, and the program in a box.
Members want to get more NEMA members to become members of YART. However, there are financial barriers. Wyant talked about how we wanted representation on the board of both public and school but that did not happen for this upcoming year. The possibility of creating a scholarship for NEMA members was discussed as well as the possibility of making a change to the YART bylaws to include a “NEMA representative” and budgeting $30 a year to pay for this person’s membership. Also discussed was the possibility of just getting a volunteer to be this representative without having to change bylaws.
Wyant advised that YART put out more publicity on the fact that there is a discount to joining YART if you are a member of NEMA. He also stressed that anyone is welcome to come to events (members and non-members) as long as they pay the event fee.
At last check there were 36 paid members in YART.

3. YART Activity
YART took over a room for the entire first day of the 2011 conference with packed audiences at all sessions.
Gordon talked about presentations that were done with Dr. Pasco’s library science classes and Bridget Kratt said YART should talk to her YA literature class about how public and school libraries should work more together.
It was discussed that YART would like to keep trying to do things across the state so that librarians farther west can participate as well. Other ideas were to do more Programs in a Box, getting speakers for events and other items that will be mentioned in more details later in these minutes.

4. Program in a Box
The YART board clarified what “program in a box” is to those in the audience who were unaware. Anyone can make the activity box and “house” it and their library. That person is then responsible for shipping (which they are reimbursed for) as well as restocking it when it gets sent back. A soft ceiling of $50 per box creating was given. The $10 fee for the box covers shipping and restocking fees.
Gordon suggested having a way to make requesting/reserving a box more automatic. It was suggested we look into Google Forms.
Mary Mollner suggested a Lewis & Clark/Western-themed box that would have immediate school librarian interest, especially if standards were included in the box.
It was suggested we look at Joslyn’s “outreach trunk” and see how their program is set up. Jake Rundle has a contact at Joslyn that he was going to talk to about this.
Matt Couch suggested a pyramid scheme/pink flamingo in the yard idea where you could send a librarian a box and tell them to make something out of it.


5. Spring and Fall Meetings
The first fall meeting in 2010 was not as well attended as was hoped but beneficial to those that came.
The spring 2011 meeting was held in Hastings to try to accommodate librarians father west. However, this still isn’t far enough west for some. North Platte was suggested as well as the possibility of webinars (via Skype, GoTo Meeting, Adobe Connect, etc.). Faye Friesen said schools will typically have the equipment needed to do something like this. It was suggested that a remote location could be set up in a town (Kearney, North Platte, etc.) so that a group of librarians could get together for it. These sessions could also possibly be recorded to view later.
Stacy Lickteig suggested that these events include topics that would appeal to school and public libraries (not just “summer reading programs”).

6. Suggestions for Next Year
Gordon stressed the importance of finding ways to increase the value for members joining YART.
Stacy said the Round Table must promote to newcomers. She suggested an “adopt a librarian” kind of program for people new to young adult services to get advice and questions answered. Melanie mentioned this was the original intent of the forum (accessible through the blog) but not much publicity has been done with it to garner interest. Gordon mentioned that with the profit we have, we could look into purchasing an online forum (instead of using a free one) if that is something we want to put our focus on.
Faye suggested that we make t-shirts for the round table. Lindsey has a screen printing press that we could make these on if interested. It was suggested that we could either have a QR code or the back of the shirt could look like a band tour shirt with dates and locations of where YART has been/will be heading next.
Communications were discussed as e-mail has, in the past, proven not to be the best way to get information out. It was suggested that a Facebook and Twitter account be created, even though many school librarians will not be able to check these during the day because of filters.
Jake wanted to stress the focusing on trying to get partnerships together with school and public libraries. It was suggested that we look into setting up/coordinating a “take your librarian to lunch” day with public and school librarians.
Bridget Kratt also mentioned getting some flyers, promotional items to her to promote through UNO’s Met Link.

YART Fall Meeting

The YART fall meeting is GO!

It is going to be a good one! You guys should totally come! Great stuff to help you deal with potential challenges to your collection, great stuff to help inspire you to have some totally awesome author visits, great ways to collaborate between public and school libraries, and some great prizes to be won!

Look at the flier, fill it out, send it in, and join us!