[ISL Announce] E-News from the ISL 07/11/08

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THIS WEEK AT THE ILLINOIS STATE LIBRARY (July 11, 2008)

Jesse White, Secretary of State and State Librarian
Anne Craig, Director

IN THIS ISSUE:

10@10 AIRS NEXT FRIDAY
Use your computer to tune into 10@10, a new ISL webcast designed for librarians of all types. The program will air next Friday, July 18 at 10:00 am. This month there will be a discussion of successful digitization projects from the Illinois State Library with ISL Digital Imaging Program Manager Alyce Scott. Alyce will discuss the Illinois Digital Archives, the Illinois Veterans History Project, and cutting-edge processes for marketing and identifying imagery for the experimental Illinois State Fair Museum Digitization project (see IDA below). You can be part of the interview through your own microphone, or by texting questions and comments to the State Library training center (instructions follow). Remember to run the Wizard at least one hour before the program, Friday July 18 at 10:00 am.

Instructions:

Run the Setup Wizard one hour before the program. It will only need to be done once and will ensure that Java is installed and everything is working correctly before you try to join the session. The session URL is [http://67.202.209.252/launcher.cgi?room=il_ISL].

FAMILY READING NIGHT MATERIALS ON THE WAY!
The first batch of Family Reading Night posters and bookmarks are in the mail. It will take a few weeks for the ISL to mail all of them to groups who have requested materials, but keep an eye out for them in the mail.

LETTERS ABOUT LITERATURE
Each year the State Library and the Illinois Center for the Book sponsor “Letters About Literature” in partnership with the Center for the Book in the Library of Congress and Target Stores. Letters About Literature is a reading and writing promotion for students in grades 4 – 12 where students read a book and write a personal letter to the author explaining how the book changed his/her perception of the world. Students can participate through their schools, youth programs, libraries or individually.

State and National winners are selected from three different judging levels based on the grade of the participating student. National winners receive a $10,000 grant for their school or community library and National honorable mentions receive a $1000 grant for the same.

Letters About Literature informational packets are sent to public and private schools across Illinois in early September, and Illinois libraries are more than welcome to be added to this mailer. If you would like to have your library added to the mailing list or have questions about Letters About Literature, please contact Bonnie Matheis, Coordinator of the Illinois Center for the Book at 217-558-2065.

The deadline to enter the 2009 Letters About Literature competition is December 14, 2008. State winners will be announced in April 2009 and national winners will be announced in May 2009. For additional information about previous Letters About Literature competitions and winners, feel free to go to the Illinois Center for the Book website. Specific information about the 2009 competition will be posted to the website in early September.

GRANT TALKIN’…STAYIN’ CONNECTED
The FY2009 Illinois Public Library Per Capita and Equalization Aid Grant application and related forms are in the mail. The application and forms are also available at the ISL website (they cannot be filled out online but may be printed out).

PER CAPITA GRANT WORKSHOPS
The State Library is offering workshops at the regional library systems during the next few months to explain requirements for obtaining an Illinois State Library Public Library Per Capita and Equalization Aid grant. ISL staff will review the grant application and explain requirements that will be in place for the next three years to obtain a grant. Persons wanting to participate should sign up at the system whose training they will be attending, and participants may attend a workshop at any of the systems offering training. While the workshops are not mandatory, participation is encouraged. Contact Mary Downing at 217-782-5506 or Jeanne Urbanek at 217-524-0050 for more information.

Grant workshops are as follows, with more to be scheduled:

  • July 18-DuPage Library System, Geneva, 10:30 a.m. – 12:30 p.m.
  • July 29–Metropolitan Library System, Burr Ridge Office from 9:00 am- 11:00 am and Tinley Park Public Library from 12:30 pm – 2:30 pm.
  • July 31-For Shawnee Library System, 9:00 a.m. to 11:00 a.m. at Rend Lake Market Place, Mt. Vernon, and 1:00 p.m. to 3:00 p.m. at Marion Carnegie Library
  • August 4-Rolling Prairie Library System, Decatur, 9:00 a.m.-11:00 a.m.
  • August 6-Lincoln Trail Libraries System, Champaign 1:30 – 3:30 p.m.
  • August 22-Lewis and Clark Library System, 1-3 p.m

ILLINET INTERLIBRARY LOAN TRAFFIC FORM FY2008 (July 1, 2007-June 30, 2008)
The ILLINET Interlibrary Loan Traffic Form FY2008 is now available for libraries to submit their resource sharing statistics as a part of the Bibliostat Collect “surveys.” The username and password are the same as detailed in the May letter announcing the release of the FY2007 Traffic Form. The extended deadline for completion of both the FY2007 and FY2008 Traffic Form is October 15, 2008; however, please complete them at your earliest convenience.

For:

  • IPLAR or ILLINET Interlibrary Loan Traffic Form content questions contact: Ron Winner
  • (IPLAR or ILLINET) Gwen Harrison
  • (ILLINET) Becky Hunter
  • (Username/Password) For troubleshooting tips, please refer to the “Tips” section in the following article.

TIPS FOR USING BIBLIOSTAT FOR IPLAR & ILLINET
Every library should be testing its Username and Password to gain access to the IPLAR and/or ILLINET ILL Traffic Form Surveys. Letters with the Username and Password have been sent to every ILLINET library via the U.S. Postal Service. You are encouraged to test your “log in” today.

If you are having technology/access issues, call the Bibliostat Help Desk at 1-866-785-9935. The Help Desk staff will walk you through some troubleshooting tips to gain access-primarily dealing with pop-up blockers and clearing your browsing history/cache.

If you are having trouble seeing the buttons at the bottom of your screen, press the F11 key. If you don’t understand IPLAR federal edit checks, send an e-mail to Ron Winner who will view your edit checks and assist you in responding to them.

If you didn’t keep your interlibrary loan statistics separated by “in-state, out-of-state, returnables, and non-returnables”, pragmatic estimates for those figures are permissible and necessary in order enable the auto-calculate functions.

If you’re not an Internet Explorer user, let Bibliostat or State Library staff know so that a copy of your “survey” can be sent to your library. The next generation of Bibliostat Collect, scheduled for release this fall, will support a variety of Internet browsers.

The “Submit Survey” button can be found by clicking on the Status and Printing link.

For IPLAR or ILLINET Interlibrary Loan Traffic Form content questions contact:

STAFF WORK WEEK

  • Anne Craig, Lawren Tucker and Kathleen Bloomberg attended an Illinois Library System Directors Organization meeting in Champaign.
  • Mary Downing and Jeanne Urbanek conducted a public library per capita grant workshop at North Suburban Library System.
  • Mark Shafer attended a Senior Olympics planning meeting in Springfield.
  • Members of the Library Development Group are among those interviewing ISL training grant applicants in Springfield this week and Chicago next week. Each year Secretary of State and State Librarian Jesse White awards 15 grants to students studying to become librarians.
  • Sharon Ruda took part in an ADA Celebration committee meeting.
  • Natalie Tagge conducted an online training session on the Ask Away virtual reference program.

E-RATE NEWS
Good news! It appears that Priority 2 requests will be funded this year. FY 2008 Funding Status Wave 11 for FY 2008 was released on Tuesday. Funding in this wave is expected to be $24.7 million. The cumulative national FY 2008 funding total is now $692 million. Although Wave 11 includes funding only for Priority 1 requests, the SLD has indicated that it expects to begin funding Priority 2 at the 90% level within the next few weeks.

(E-Rate Central News July 7, 2008)

LITERACY SPOTLIGHT
Every week we honor a provider who receives a literacy grant from Secretary of State Jesse White and the Illinois State Library Literacy Office. This week we shine the spotlight on Illinois Eastern Community Colleges (Frontier Community College) in Fairfield.

When students improve their basic literacy skills, many goals can be achieved. For example, a student from China began studying with two tutors at Frontier to improve her English conversational skills. As she read through her English/Chinese Oxford dictionary with her tutors, she came across vocabulary words she did not understand. She and her tutors studied words grouped into various themes, including parts of the body, workplace words and many words used frequently such as “Where is…?”. Her tutors also took her on field trips around their small community to visit the post office, library and shops, helped her study for the written portion of her driver’s test and gave her driving lessons. Eventually the student easily passed both parts of her driver’s test. Her new goal is to become a United States citizen, so that she can sponsor her mother to come to America from China.

Another student is deeply religious and wanted to learn to read the Bible and other religious books. She also wanted to write letters to her son. The student is making excellent progress and can compose letters more easily. Eventually she plans to obtain her GED.

In addition to assisting students, this program makes a difference in the lives of volunteer tutors that are trained and supported through the program. Several widows and a widower say tutoring has helped them deal with loneliness they have experienced after losing a spouse. Four senior citizens over the age of 80 are still giving back to their communities as literacy volunteers.

Learn more about the ISL Literacy Office and the hundreds of literacy providers who receive grants from us.

GOVDOCINFO
High gas prices and electric bills are making citizens more concerned about energy efficiency. The U.S. Department of Energy has a web page devoted to options for saving energy and using renewable energy at home, at work, in your community, and while driving.

CULTURAL AWARENESS: DIVERSITY IN ACTION
This month the ISL Diversity Program is celebrating “Americana.” Americana refers to artifacts and culture of the United States pertaining to history as a result of the expansion toward the West in the United States. The University of Illinois at Urbana/Champaign has an Americana collection relevant to 20th Century farm life.

The collection includes bulletins, handbooks, manufacturers’ catalogs and manuals
pertaining to repair of trunks, plows, tractors, farm machinery, appliances, ranges and other items. For more information, search “Americana”, then “Records and Manuscripts”.

ILLINOIS DIGITAL ARCHIVES
We’re four weeks from the start of another Illinois State Fair, and to get you in the mood here are some photos from the Illinois State Fair Museum.

ILLINOIS INVENTOR OF THE WEEK
Frank A. Fouts of Bloomington is this week’s Illinois Inventor of the Week. Fouts was granted Design Patent Number 9,326 on May 10, 1876, for “Design for Paperweights, featuring the old Independence Bell surmounted by an eagle.” The Illinois State Library Patent & Trademark Depository Library is available to assist you with your patent and trademark questions. Contact us at (217) 782-5659.

SPREAD THE NEWS ABOUT E-NEWS!
Our weekly newsletter is the best source available to find out what’s going on at the State Library-everything from grant offerings and important meetings to news about electronic resources. We’re glad to have you as a subscriber, but if you know of anyone else you think should be getting E-news from the ISL, let us know and we’ll sign him or her up, or have him or her contact Pat McGuckin. Join the more than 6,000 subscribers who depend on E-news every Friday to find out what’s happening at the State Library!

UPCOMING EVENTS

  • August 5-7-Synergy, Pere Marquette Lodge, Grafton
  • August 7-Project Next Generation picnic, ISL
  • August 8-17-ISL at the Illinois State Fair
  • October 2-3-Reaching Forward South Conference, Springfield
  • October 7-ILLINET Network Advisory Council meeting, ISL
  • December 4-ISL Electronic Resource Exposition (E-R-XPO), Schaumburg Township District Library

Questions about “E-News from the ISL” should be referred to Pat McGuckin, Illinois State Library or 217-558-4029. Please let me know if you ever have trouble accessing any of the website or e-mail links listed in the weekly newsletter.

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