The Fowler Branch Library finally has a commemorative plaque spotlighting the contributions of donors who helped make the new library possible. The donor plaque was expertly installed in the branch foyer in early January thanks to maintenance staffers Reid and Ziggy.
Library Development Officer Linda Calandra worked with the Project Architect Loyd Rolle, Community Libraries East Supervisor Terry Sterling, and Fowler community members Sandra Arakelian and Ted and Arpie Dick to make the final selection for the plaque. Linda was the guiding force in selecting a plaque which matched the scope of the project extremely well. The wall looks wonderful, and the Fowler community is so proud to see it on display in a place of prominence.Terry Sterling, Headquarters
24-HOUR READATHON
Come out to the Sweet River Grill at the Sierra Vista Mall in Clovis starting at 11 am on Thursday, February 5. Community celebrities and staff will read Mark Twain’s The Adventures of Tom Sawyer all through the wee hours of the evening and very early morning for our third 24-hour readathon to kick off The Big Read. The readathon will conclude at 11 am on Friday, February 6.
Bring along your copy of the book and your family and friends to help create a big audience for our volunteer readers. This is a wonderful community event that launches over two months and more than 150 programs for our third Big Read.
Major sponsors for this year’s Big Read include The Fresno Bee, ABC 30, K-Jewel and KYNO radio, San Joaquin River Parkway and Conservancy Trust, and Sierra Vista Mall.
Roberta Barton, Headquarters
FIT FOR LIFE KICK-OFF
The Library’s Fit for Life initiative focusing on brain health and health literacy will kick off on Saturday, February 28 with a family celebration at the Mosqueda Community Center from 10 am to 2:30 pm. Demonstrations and other interactive events will be scheduled throughout the day, and our community partners will be on hand with valuable health information.
Major community partners include:
- First 5 Fresno County
- Fresno County Public Library
- MetLife Foundation
- Libraries for the Future
- California Association for Health, Physical Education, Recreation and Dance
- Centro La Familia
- Children’s Hospital Central California
- City of Fresno Parks, After School, Recreation and Community Services
- Clear Channel Communications
- Community Food Bank
- Fresno County Department of Health
- Fresno County Office of Education
- Fresno Metropolitan Museum
- Kaiser Permanente
- Valley Public Television
- Save Mart Supermarkets
- University of California Cooperative Extension
Eat it.
Move it.
Play it.
Think it.
You’re Fit for Life
Messages will be shared countywide through distribution of “Healthy Body = Healthy Brain” Tool Kits at library programs and partner events from February through November 2009. Branches will receive fliers for the kick-off celebration in a few weeks.
Roberta Barton and Linda Calandra, Headquarters
THE IMPORTANCE OF SPICE
I’m not a cook at all, but I do get by, and one of my resolutions for 2009 is to really really...cook!
My branch, the Fresno County Library Community Bookmobile, boasts a really eclectic collection of cookbooks, and I have no excuse for not checking them out. In fact, the bookmobile actually has a very interesting book that talks about herbs and spices.
Now, why am I on this trail? I guess it’s because I’ve been thinking about Life, and a new year, and the word spice. You can rhyme it with dice, mice, twice, slice, nice, and entice. Entice. Now that’s a great word: I would like, very much, to entice you with the world of poetry.
We’re very fortunate here in the Central Valley and all of California with the many opportunities to read, submit work, or read our work aloud if we choose too. Some of these opportunities are right here before you. One is the poetry podcast on the Fresno County Library web page. At first created by our own librarian Rochelle Carr, the podcast torch has continued to radiate due to the hard work and creativity of Lisa Erven and James Tyner.
Take a look at the new format for the podcast as well as the introductory photograph. Just beautiful. Lisa and James encourage staff and the community to contact them to read/record for the podcast and to also submit your photography, as well, for consideration. Lisa and James, thank you both for your diligence and devotion in allowing many of us to express our work and share our passion for writing and reading.
At this time, I also want to thank librarian Linda Aragon who has been successfully indispensible in continuing the open mic poetry readings at Central. There were 15 of us in the Sarah McCardle room last November, and I was pleased to see community patrons as well as staff, poets of diverse ages and background, applauding one another’s work. Whether you choose to read or not, you will be embraced by sincerity and camaraderie. Be there and enjoy the evening!
Karen Maj, Community Bookmobile
GOING GREEN
Speaking of new year resolutions...don’t forget to make 2009 a greener year at your work site! Here are a few tips to help you “go green!”
- Visit our Training page on the Intranet and learn how to create a “green” email signature, which asks those who receive your emails to consider the environment before they print your message.
- Turn off your computer screen every night to save electricity.
- Remind patrons that the library offers alternatives to paper receipts. Among the more environment-friendly options to keep track of due dates for checked out materials:
- Online library account
- Email notices and pre-overdue reminders
- Phone notices
Roberta Barton, Headquarters
FOOD DRIVE RESULTS
Staff came through this holiday season to help feed hungry Valley families. The first Staff Association holiday food drive resulted in 2.5 barrels of food donated to the Community Food Bank, which sent this heartfelt note of appreciation:
“On behalf of the Community Food Bank … thank you for generously hosting a 2008 Holiday Food Drive. Your efforts to support our community reflect the true supportive character of the people who live here. The food you donated will be offered to our partnering food pantries, who in turn will distribute the food to hungry families throughout the Central Valley. It is the outstanding support from organizations like the Fresno County Library that enable the Community Food Bank to effectively strive towards our vision; to creat a hunger-free Central Valley. Thank you for your generosity. It is these true acts of kindness that inspire us to continue working towards ending hunger. Together we can make a difference.”
Kelly Barile, Support Services
RETIREMENT REMEMBERED
For those who missed Elida Mendoza’s retirement party in December, we’re sharing a few photos of the festivities here celebrating her 29 years of library service.
It was a very memorable party thanks to the hard work of several staff “party planners.” One of the nicest touches was the amusing retirement-related quotes by Gene Perret which decorated the tables:Retirement is wonderful. It’s doing nothing without worrying about getting caught at it.
I enjoy waking up and not having to go to work. So I do it three or four times a day.
That’s when you return from work one day and say, “Hi, Honey. I’m home – forever.”
The best time to start thinking about your retirement is before your boss does.
Elida has already returned to the library on an extra help part time basis to keep everything running smoothly until her former position is filled. Even though she’s in the office temporarily, Elida is enjoying spending extra time with her husband and family. Her kindness and smile will be missed, but we wish her the best in retirement.
Roberta Barton, Headquarters
NEW FROM THE PROFESSIONAL LIBRARY
Chase’s Calendar of Events 2009 offers more than 12,000 entries detailing milestones, observances and other occasions to help you plan special events and campaigns.
Privacy and Confidentiality Issues by Theresa Chmara. This guide is set up in a frequently asked questions format to offer answers around First Amendment issues. Interspersed among the questions and answers are actual cour case studies.
Public Libraries and Internet Service Roles by Charles McClure and Paul Jaeger. Offers information discussing the importance of measuring and maximizing library service through Internet services, new and unique Internet-enabled service roles of public libraries, and selection and creation of Internet-enabled service roles.
More Family Storytimes by Rob Reid. Features stories, fingerplays, songs and movement activities to enhance the time families spend at the library.
Fundamentals of Collection Development and Management by Peggy Johnson. Each chapter offers complete coverage of one aspect of collection development, including suggestions for further reading and a narrative case study exploring the issue.
Connecting Boys with Books by Michael Sullivan. Learn about the books boys love to read, uncover the signs that point to the reading gap, find creative new programming ideas to match boys' interests and establish a strategic blueprint for boys and reading.
Virtual Reference Best Practices by M. Kathleen Kern. Outlines the tools and decision-making process that will help you and your library evaluate, tailor and launch virtual reference services that are a perfect fit for your community.
Teen Spaces: The Step-by-Step Library Makeover by Kimberly Bolan. Provides step-by-step instructions and easy-to-use templates, the latest information on teen spaces policies, new ways to involve teens in the space-renovation process and updated tools, worksheets, instructions and vendor information.
Camille Turner, Headquarters
TECH TALK: INTERNET EXPLORER 7
Tech Support has been upgrading Public and Staff computers with the newest internet browsing software. IE7 is Microsoft’s newest version for surfing the web. There are a few changes in appearance as well as function and security. It took me a while to get used to the new browser but I gave it a chance and I’m really very happy with how it works. I’ll go over a few of the features to help you become more comfortable with the changes.
Getting Started – Staff & Public
IE7 in the Staff and Public profiles are preconfigured by Tech Support and will not need any further adjustments.
Getting Started – Personal Profile
When you log into your personal 3+4 profile you may be asked to set your preferences. Read instructions carefully and set things up the way you prefer with home pages, search providers, etc. Remember to save your settings or these same “set-up” pages will come up every time you open Internet Explorer. If you have questions while customizing your settings, contact Tech Support.
Tabs
The most noticeable change is the tabbed browsing. Now, you can open multiple Web pages without opening new windows, meaning your desktop stays pretty clean even if you have a dozen Web pages open at a time. And you will only see one Internet Explorer box open in the taskbar. The taskbar is at the bottom of the screen/desktop and shows the current programs in use. To open a new webpage, click on the New Tab and type in the address in the address bar at the top.
(Click on image to enlarge.)
Quick Tabs
Try clicking on the Quick Tabs and
Tab List for a quick overview of all pages open.
(Click on image to enlarge.)
Closing a Web Page
To close a single Web page, click on the small X on the tab of that Web page. To close ALL the Web, pages, click on the X on the top right of the main Internet Explorer window.
Favorites
Saving a page to your Favorites allows you to easily go back and find your “favorite” and frequently visited sites. A page or set of tabbed pages can be added to your Favorites by clicking on the little gold stars on the top left.
Toolbar
The toolbar looks quite different in IE7 than in IE6. Everything that you’re used to using in IE6 is still there, but you may find it in a different place. Don’t hesitate to click around and see what’s there. The new toolbar is a bit more streamlined with lots of icons with more drop-down menus. I’ll briefly go over the icons and what you will find there.
(Click on image to enlarge.)
1. Home
Set or make changes to your Home Page. Your Home Page is the page that opens up when you first go on to the internet.
2. RSS
Short for Really Simple Syndication. RSS is a way to subscribe to a source of information, such as a Web site, and get brief updates delivered to you. This is not an application that most of us will use. If you want to know more about how RSS works, I suggest doing some research online. A good place to start is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rss
3. Print
Clicking directly on the printer icon will send the page to the current default printer on the computer. You can click on the small down arrow for the usual options, Print, Print Preview and Page Setup. Contact Tech Support if your default printer is not set up correctly.
4. Page
The Page icon combines some features of the old File and View commands from previous versions of Internet Explorer. You can save a shortcut to the web page to a location of your choice, copy highlighted content, change font size and zoom in or out on the page. You can also send the page or a link in email from here, but the results are not reliable. I recommend copying the link and pasting it directly into an open Outlook message.
5. Tools
There is a host of nifty little tools here. You can click on Delete Browsing History to clean up your Temporary Internet Files, Cookies, History, Website Passwords, etc. You can set your browser to block or unblock pop-ups. This comes in handy when a site requires a pop-up for proper viewing. You can also customize your toolbar by adding, deleting and arranging icons exactly how you want them. Click on the Internet Options to set your Home Page preferences, select your search defaults and change how web pages are displayed in Tabs. Be careful before making any changes in the other tabbed sections. Changes made in areas other than the General section should be made by advanced users only. If you have questions about settings in these areas, contact Tech Support as they have preconfigured the defaults for optimal internet usage for Library staff.
6. Search Box
Quick and easy web searches can be done from this location with no need to open up another web page. To change your default search provider, click on the little arrow to the right of the magnifying glass, select Find More Providers and follow the directions.
Hopefully this information will help you to get the most from your new Internet Explorer 7. And don’t get too comfortable! Microsoft will undoubtedly come out with a newer version with more bells and whistles just about the time we have become familiar with version 7.
Jill Potter, Support Services
WARNING SIGNS OF A “BOOKAHOLIC”
- Have the library’s reserve phone number on speed dial.
- Resorts to reading cereal boxes when there are no books around the house.
- Never checks out less than three books.
- Starts removing the family photos off the shelves to make room for books.
- Can name the last three books read, but not what he/she ate for breakfast.
- Goes to the doctor and has already read all the magazines.
- Gets withdrawal when there’s nothing to read (usually happens on three-day public holidays when libraries are closed on Mondays).
- Can never be more than ten feet from a book.
- Will read past midnight just to finish off a good book.
- Lies about how many books he/she really owns (books stashed in closets or under the bed DO count.
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