Interlibrary Loan Scholarship

From the Northwest Interlibrary Loan and Resource Sharing Conference:

This year we are happy to announce that the Northwest Interlibrary Loan and Resource Sharing (NWILL) Conference Committee is committed to sponsoring the attendance of ILL practitioners, who would be unable to attend unless otherwise subsidized.

 Applicants must provide feedback during the conference as well as communicate what they hope to learn by attending the conference, and how they will share that information with others in their own libraries.

Applicants must demonstrate a true financial need. Applications must be received by June 1, 2014. Scholarships are dependent on the generosity of our sponsors.

We will announce the number of $500 scholarships by July 7, 2014. Winners will be announced by July 31, 2014. To apply for the NWILL Scholarship click here.

The OLA 2014 conference and SSD

I had a great time at the 2014 OLA conference last week, attending informative and thought-provoking sessions, and chatting with colleagues I hadn't seen recently.  SSD sponsored a number of sessions, in addition to a pre-conference.  I was impressed with the two SSD sessions I attended.

The first, "Oral History and Libraries: a Perfect Fit", highlighted Lake Oswego Public Library's "In Their Own Words II" project.  I was impressed at how much they had accomplished, and it really got me to thinking about the importance of capturing oral history.  (Alas, since I was on the conference committee, I had to leave that session early).

The second, "Our First Digital Collection: Starting From Scratch with Nothing", reviewed Multnomah County Library's first digital collection: Central Library: Historic Photographs.  Mostly using tools they already had, great organization, and some in-house crowdsourcing, they were able to get the collection ready for the Central Library's anniversary.  The presenter gave excellent advice about planning and project management.

Major kudos to SSD for providing such great programming!  

Slides for all the OLA session are (or will be soon) available on Northwest Central.

Secret messages found in library!

Secret message found in Weldon Library

Someone has been leaving coded messages in books at D.B. Weldon Library! Mike Moffat is keeping track of them in his blog over at Reflections on Southwestern Ontario.  What do they mean?  Who is leaving them?  They come with trinkets and drawings and are so far inscrutable. I love this kind of thing, which is why I rated Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore so highly in goodreads.

If your library has themed displays for the coming planting season, a seed library might be a good addition.  It seems seed libraries would be a good fit in Oregon.

Multnomah County Library is celebrating it's 150th anniversary this year, and Kelly House, a reporter at the Oregonian, was lucky enough to get a peek in some of the early historical records. The founders certainly had some beautiful penmanship.

There was a recent story about Google having the interiors of libraries available through Street View over on ebookfriendly.com, but they don't compare to the interior tour you can take of the Strahov Library, which is the worlds largest indoor picture as of March 2011.  It is beautiful.  You can take the tour (which might take a little too much time if you're at work) or you can click and pan and zoom on your own, and get closer than you ever could in real life.  The resolution is stunning.

Strahov Ceiling Detail

Cool things going on in the library world

The March edition of Associates is out.  It is an online publication written and organized by global library support staff.  I had more time this week than usual to read the articles. I particularly enjoyed Sally McMaster's account of stepping into the role of President of the NYSLAA (New York State Library Assistants' Association) and organizing a conference, never having done so before.  It's so closely parallels what I've heard board members/committee volunteers talk about in SSD - it's challenging, but the past chair and other board members are there to help and they always have an amazing experience.  The NYSLAA also seems to have the same goals and aspirations to support library paraprofessionals in their jobs as we do at OLA-SSD. It was cool to read about a similar organization doing a similar thing on the other side of the country.  Check it out.  (The books-to-movies discussion was a good read, too.)

April 16th is fast approaching!  What is so special about the 16th?  This year, in case you haven't heard, we're joining up with OLA and sponsoring sessions at their conference.  You can see a list of the sessions on our 2014 conference page.  One thing that piqued my interested was the announcement that Phillip Margolin will be speaking at the PLD (Public Library Division) banquet on the Wednesday 16th.  And you all know Josh Hanagarne, the "World's Strongest Librarian" is the banquet speaker on the 17th, right?

Have I left anything out?

-Rebecca