NOYS: Teen Poetry Contest

Thursday is April 1st, which means (aside from all the April Foolin' happening) it's the start of our annual teen poetry contest.The contest starts today and runs through the end of the month. More details on the website, but here are the basics:

1. All poems must be submitted using the online form.

2. Participants must fill out all of the required fields on the form.

3. There are two categories: middle school and high school. Participants must be between 7th-12th grade. One winner from each category will win a Borders gift card.

4. Only one poem per person will be considered for the contest.

5. Only one poem per person will be printed in the book.

Encourage the teens you know to participate!

NOYS: Teen Tech Week 2010

Teen Tech Week is back! During March 7-13th, teens can submit a review about nearly anything* and we'll put their name in a drawing for several Barnes & Noble gift cards. But that's not all! They can also friend us on MySpace, Facebook, YouTube or Twitter and we'll add their name again!

And why do we celebrate Teen Tech Week? Because we here at the library believe that Technology + Teens = Awesomeness.

*Nearly anything: books, movies, tv show, music, video games, magazines, comics/graphic novels, audiobooks, etc. Basically, anything you can get at the library.

NOYS: Student Film Festival a success!

The Get Reel! Student Film Festival was Saturday, December 5 from 3-8 at the Tower theater. More than a hundred people came out to watch student films and cheer for the winners. It was so touching to see teens in our community being supported by their families and teachers. We met a father who drove in from Los Angeles and grandparents who came from the coast, plus aunts and uncles and cousins and siblings from all over the valley--all to see their loved one's film on the big screen. Most of the student filmmakers came dressed for an awards ceremony, with guys in ties and girls in dresses. It was really heartwarming.

Special thanks to Gina Becker, who chaired the committee and worked very hard to make sure every last detail was in place. Awesome job! Also to Faythe Arredondo, who spent hours upon hours prepping the films for the all-day screening and editing the films into tidy clip packages for the awards ceremony. Amazing! Other staffers who contributed to the event's success: Brian Guenther, Jonathan Waltmire, Lisa Eckman, Raelene Fleming, Les, Hiatt, and Jennifer Kish. Thanks!

Congratulations to all of the participants. Winner of the $500 Best of Show prize is:

Delivery Dash
Scott Callisch


See the other winning films!

-Connie Urquhart,
Teen Services Coordinator 

NOYS: Get Reel this Saturday!

Just a quick reminder that the FCPL Get Reel Student Film Festival is this Saturday at the Tower Theater. Special thanks to Gina Becker and Faythe Arredondo who are tirelessly putting together the finishing touches as we speak. See below for details and we hope to see you on Saturday!

3:00pm-5:30pm Screening of all films

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  Films will be shown by category, NOT age group, in this order: Animation, Commercial/psa, EECU commercial, Documentary, Feature Short, Music Video
  
  
  
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  Audience members will vote for their favorite for the $250 Audience Choice Award
  
  
  

5:30pm-7:00pm Reception in Lobby

• Meet other filmmakers, enjoy free food from Charlotte's Bakery, or take a walk in the famous Tower District

7:00pm-8:00pm Awards Ceremony

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  Clips of nominated films will be shown and prizes awarded
  
  
  
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  Door prizes will be given away between categories
  
  
  

Everything is FREE and open to the public!

NOYS: Teens' Top Ten

Your teens can be heard on a national level! Teens' Top Teen is like the Teen Choice Awards for books. There are 25 nominated books published last year and teens can vote for three. The top ten vote-getters become this year's Teens' Top Ten. Easy peasy.

Voting open until Friday, September 18th. Winners announced during Teen Read Week, October 18th-24th.

Tell your teens to vote now!

NOYS: Fun Stuff for Teens

In these times of budget crisis, it’s even more crucial to spend every dollar wisely. Just as Adult Services has changed their approach to collection development, Youth Services is making some changes in selection as well. To view areas of responsibility among the YS Collection Development Team, go here: http://intra.fresnolibrary.org/com/child/index.html.

Among the changes in our approach to youth collections is the emphasis on selecting more fun nonfiction for teens. Circulation stats reveal that the majority of curriculum-based teen nonfiction rarely circulates, while entertainment-based nonfiction has a much higher turnover rate. This doesn’t mean we’ll stop buying homework-type books altogether, but it does mean that those books will primarily reside in bigger branches. Meanwhile, smaller branches will slowly transition into more of a popular browsing collection, much like their fiction counterparts. As always, ready reference resources and our complete set of online reference tools will be available at all branches.

This is just one of the changes we’re making in order to serve our community better and spend our money more wisely. We’ll keep you updated in further NOYS posts about other ways we’re working to create useful and well-used collections.

For samples of "fun nonfiction", check out these staff summer reading program reviews or our recommendations on read.watch.listen.

NOYS: Read.Watch.Listen. turns 1!

On June 9, read.watch.listen celebrated its one year anniversary. In that time:

• Hits on the homepage have almost tripled
• There has been a 40% increase in hits compared to the first six months
• There have been 335 reviews submitted from teens
• Hits are coming in from all over the world - from Canada to Cameroon to Australia
• Partnerships are being formed with local youth organizations, such as The kNOw and The Fresno Youth Folklore Society
• Authors have thanked RWL staff for their support & offered to contribute to our site themselves.

Thanks to all staff who have supported us through the last year. And, a special thanks to the 2009-2010 RWL staff: Faythe Arredondo, Lisa Lindsay, Gina Becker, Jennifer Bethel, and Ryan Ewers.

--Connie Urquhart, Teen Services Coordinator