Category: Uncategorized

After reviewing 46 applications, interviewing 9 candidates, and endlessly discussing–with Molly, Beth, and Lynne—the merits and demerits of them all, I’ve offered the Youth Services Librarian position to Megan Sockness. Megan is currently the Youth Services Librarian at Washington County Libraries in Minnesota. Her resume, cover letter, and references are linked below. Megan will start in early October. Please welcome our new hire and help her see how great working at JPL can be.

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/0B6lTezDMYi83cDJmeURGeVFWNmc?usp=sharing

Location: Stephens Auditorium, Iowa State Center – Doors open at 6:15

“Cheryl Strayed is the author of the #1 New York Times bestselling memoir Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail. The book and 2014 movie adaptation starring Reese Witherspoon recounts how at age 22, shattered by her mother’s death and the end of her young marriage, Strayed decides to confront her emotional pain by trekking more than 1,000 miles from the Mojave Desert to the Oregon-Washington border. Now in her forties, Strayed is the cohost with Steve Almond of Dear Sugar Radio, an advice podcast for the lost, lonely and heartsick produced by WBUR Radio. She is a graduate of the University of Minnesota and holds an MFA in fiction writing from Syracuse University. Her other books include the advice essay collection Tiny Beautiful Things and the novel Torch. She is also a regular columnist for the New York Time Book Review.

In her memoir Wild Cheryl Strayed describes the sometimes harrowing, other times hilarious stories behind her solo wilderness trek on the Pacific Crest Trail and the personal journey that led her there. In this talk, Strayed will discuss what she learned about how we bear the unbearable, how we move from grief and anger to acceptance, and how we keep walking even when it seems impossible to stand.”

http://amespubliclibrary.evanced.info/signup/EventDetails?EventId=12056

Circulation staff will no longer distribute guest passes. Patrons will be directed to the Public Services Desk or Youth Services Desk.

The west most Commons door was not latching last night. Peg was able to wrangle it closed and lasso it shut. I stopped in this morning and was able to get the latch working and temporarily brace it closed. A crew will be out Tuesday to fix everything. Until then, please leave the barricade in front of the doors.

• The Study: http://www.pewinternet.org/2016/09/01/book-reading-2016/
  

• A growing share of Americans are reading e-books on tablets and smartphones rather than dedicated e-readers, but print books remain much more popular than books in digital formats
• The share of Americans who have read a book in the last year is largely unchanged since 2012; more Americans read print books than either read e-books or listen to audio books
• Nearly four-in-ten Americans read print books exclusively; just 6% are digital-only book readers

The Johnston schools dropped off a copy of the 2016 Iowa Youth Survey for residents to review. It will be kept at the reference desk.

We could use another burst of staff picks for display in the online catalog. Follow the link under “Staff Resources” top get started (this section is for Adult & YA titles only).

Eric

A new Conduct in the Library Policy was approved by the Library Board. The new policy will formally take effect Monday, September 5^th.

To track conduct violations, Youth Services and Public Services staff will be submitting reports via a new intranet page linked under the “Helping Patrons” menu (to the left).

Non-behavior related incidents should continue to be reported via incident reports.

Staff from other departments are not expected to submit conduct reports but should refer behavior issues to YS or PS staff.

All PAC functionality has been restored. The “forgot your password” feature now sends a new password to the patron via email (instead of sending their existing password). Please let me know if you hear of any problems.

If someone has forgotten their photo ID or library card, they cannot checkout. Sometimes we need to help patrons figure out an alternative. If it is a kid, ask them if the person that brought them can check it out for them. If it is an adult, offer to hold the item at the Circulation Desk for a couple of days. Please explain to patrons that we require a library card or photo ID to checkout items in order to protect cardholders. If they press the issue, please send them to the Circulation Desk. Circulation staff will receive further clarification from me.

We received 46 applications for the YS Librarian position. We will finish an initial round of interviews with 9 candidates next week and will schedule a second, more informal interview with three or four of the best candidates for the following week. The rest of the timeline for the hiring process is included below.

• Present hire to Library Board on 9/15 and to City Council 9/19

• New hire will start Monday 10/10

The online catalog is back. Please report any bugs. The password retreival functionality still needs work; this should be fixd by tomorrow.

A change in patron authentication with the new version of Polaris is going to requre a much more complicated solution than I anticipated. With three interviews today it will be tough to get this done before tonight. I’ve left a note on the PAC for patrons to call to request renewals, holds, etc.

Once again, this is sort of last minute:

Felix & Oscars does a trivia night at 9:00 PM on Fridays.  The have half price appetizers and BOGO on house drinks and pints of draft beer from 9-11.  If you are available and interested in stopping by, some of the library staff will be attending tomorrow.  We will plan to meet at 8:30 PM, or there abouts.  Feel free to stop by!  I am going to try and get a large table to fit 10 or so.

This is partly in celebration of my graduation from graduate school, but it is also just for fun. I think we could be a really strong team! 

Send me an email if you are interested: olson@johnstonlibrary.com

Felix & Oscars

Haymarket Square, 4050 Merle Hay Rd, Des Moines, IA 50310

http://www.felixandoscars.com/trivia/

Just a refresher that per library policy, library records are confidential. That means that we should not be releasing the specific titles from the circulation record to anyone but the cardholder. The cardholder is the person holding the card or the person showing a photo ID that matches the account. If man has his spouse’s card, he has access to the account.

The policy does allow us to release overdue titles to the parents or guardians of minors without the library card in hand. That means that we can release titles to the mother of a 16-year-old if the items in question are overdue and she is trying to find them or she wants to know what they are before she pays. Polaris will show the 16-year-old as an adult, but minor means anyone under 18.

The Confidentiality Policy is on the Intranet if you have any questions. I also have some “fun” links I can share if anyone is interested in more information on the subject.

The Library Board met last Thursday. I’ve highlighted some of what was discussed below.

• Revision to the Conduct In the Library Policy discussed at the most recent staff meeting was approved. More information regarding an effective date forthcoming.
• The openings to the staff area behind the checkout desk mean there is no way to completely block the staff area from the public area in the event of a physical threat or some other emergency. We received a quote last April for installing doors between the checkout desk and the staff area. The board gave the go-ahead on the project. The doors will be held open with magnetic latches. Staff will be able to close both doors with a push of one of the buttons that will be installed inside each entry. Work will begin sometime this fall or early winter.
• Walsh door recently serviced the Commons exit doors. The mechanism between the push-bar and the latch at the bottom tends to get dirty and cause the doors to stick open. Walsh did some adjustments and lubrication and things seems to be working well.
• We received another notice from Century Link, the Internet service provider for our public Internet, that our network was being used for illegal downloads and our service may be discontinued if further violations occur. In response, we’ve limited BitTorrent traffic to 250kbps. We’ll place signs on tables and in the PC carrels that summarize copyright law and that also say that we’ll work with (i.e. Remove bandwidth caps for) those with a legitimate use for BitTorrent.
• We recently received three 4G hotspots from Mobile Beacon, a nonprofit whose mission is to help others provide internet access. The hotspots cost $10 each. Each hotspot requires an annual contract that includes unlimited monthly data for $120 annually. We will soon begin checking out the hotspots from our Learning Tools collection to allow those without internet access at home or on the road to stay connected.

This Thursday, we will be upgrading to version 5.1, Service Pack 1 of Polaris.  We’ll start the upgrade around 7 a.m., and we hope to be finished by 11:00 a.m.

The changes will be minor and include:

• The number of linked items will appear in the bib header

• The patron registration block will be removed immediately after you update the expiration date.  Prior to the upgrade, staff either have to remove the block manually or wait for it to be cleared in overnight processing.
• When a missing part is checked in, the block will be cleared no matter the circulation status.  Prior to the upgrade, the missing part block remains if the status changes to On Hold.
• There is a new report that will help us identify ILL items on hold that were not picked up by patrons.  At present, ILL transactions are not included on the unclaimed holds report.  They still won’t be after the upgrade, but they will appear in a separate report that Technical Services will run.

Hey all, 

An impromptu gathering for JPL staff has spontaneously developed–much like a summer storm. 

All are welcome and invited to meet for dinner and/or drinks at Fletcher’s in Ankey this Thursday, August 18 at 6:30ish. 

Link to the restaurant is here: http://www.the-fletcher.com/ and the address is 1802 N Ankeny Blvd #100, Ankeny, IA 50023.

This is casual, come-if-you-can, but only if you want, thing. 

Hope to see you there. 

Also, for those with a refined palete, the link to the Register’s review is here: http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/money/business/2016/04/21/restaurant-dahls-ankeny-elwell/83356432/