Trump Entertainment Resorts, Atlantic City, N.J., and the New Jersey State Library partnered to offer customer service training to more than 100 library staff members on June 19. The training was held at the Trump Taj Mahal Casino and Resort in Atlantic City, NJ. The training session received overwhelmingly positive reviews from those who attended. Full story
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Did you know that the most common disaster in New Jersey is flooding? Hurricanes, tropical storms, nor-easters, as well as winter snow melt and ice blockages lead to a major disaster in New Jersey at least once a year. In response to the flooding in the Midwest, Heritage Preservation, the leading national, nonprofit advocate for the proper care of historical objects and sites, has released a free, online video guide to coping with water damage. This 10-minute streaming video segment from the award-winning Field Guide to Emergency Response provides professional advice to help libraries, museums, and archives salvage damaged collections. You will find straightforward advice and practical tips on safety, simple equipment, and salvage priorities to help get you started on the rescue of photographs, books, documents, and other valued items.
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Video
Heritage Preservation
A plan to preserve New Jersey’s rich cultural treasures held in museums, libraries and archives has come to fruition thanks to a Statewide Planning Grant from the federal Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) through their “Connecting to Collections preservation initiative.
For the first time a consortium of New Jersey cultural institutions, including the New Jersey State Library, The Newark Museum, the Rutgers University Libraries, the New Jersey State Museum, and the New Jersey State Archives, have the opportunity to assess statewide preservation needs and to develop short and long-term plans to conserve New Jersey’s vast collection materials. Groups representing libraries, history museums and archives throughout the state, including the New Jersey Library Association are involved in the planning process.
For further information contact Michele Stricker, Consultant, Library Development Bureau at 609-278-2640 Ext. 164 or email mstricker@njstatelib.
Voting ended on December 31 and over 17,000 votes were cast. We will be announcing the winners this month!
The State Library has been working with INFOLINK to sponsor a YouTube/Comic Contest. Young adults up to the age of 18 were able to submit a comic or video.
• The 5th Annual Trustee Institute was held Sept. 28-20 at Ocean Place in Long Branch. Over 200 trustees attended programs that followed this year’s theme of the Library as the Third Place, or as the keynote speaker referred to it, the “great good place”. As has been the case with our prior year programs, the State Library partnered with the NJ Library Association and the NJ Library Trustee Association on this popular event.
• The first meeting of the State Librarian’s Blue Ribbon Task Force on the Future of Libraries took place in September. The task force will meet once a month for four months, discussing one topic each month. The Task Force will produce a report to the State Librarian on the possibilities and opportunities it identifies to keep libraries relevant for customers now and in the future.
• NJKI Advocacy took center stage in September as many LDB staff were involved in a variety of activities including: planning a meeting regarding the continued funding of NJKI in FY08; reporting on the status of NJKI to library, business and legislative partners; preparation of advocacy documents for use by NJKI customers; meetings to present the case for NJKI to state legislators and staff; and continued participation in events designed to market and showcase this program.
• LDB’s youth services consultant was a guest on A.M. Connections discussing good books for parents and caregivers to share with their children.
Staff members have been working with the New Jersey Library Association and the Department of Community Affairs on recent issues such as excluding municipal libraries from the recently enacted 4% cap on new municipal tax revenue, the need for municipal libraries to receive the full one-third mill from the municipality and various trustee term issues.
The draft amendments to NJAC 15:21.12, the regulation developed to clarify the one-third-mill rules for municipal and joint public libraries, will not move forward until NJSL receives the Deputy Attorney General opinion regarding whether or not trustees may give any funding raised by the 1/3 mill law to the municipality to be used for non-library purposes.
NJKI staff attended the ACT subcommittee working group meeting where the Deputy Chief of the Governor’s Office of Economic Growth Angie Maguire talked about how important NJKI and libraries are to the state’s economic growth strategy. This committee is charged with developing a new program to meet the needs of the state’s entrepreneurs and small businesses in a more comprehensive and productive structure.
The NJKI task force continued to meet and outline the strategy required to fill the gap in NJKI funding for the remainder of FY 08. As part of this strategy, additional legislative visits are being planned for September.
Four Reference USA and four JerseyCat Customization Training Sessions were held around the state last month.
As a result of LDB staff efforts, over 160 public libraries are now using Get A Library Card Online.
JerseyCat ISO compliance Preparation and Testing was completed last month and the first request using this system was sent on July 25. This is a huge accomplishment, as it will enable local libraries to update statuses, will reduce the amount of clerical work necessary by JerseyCAT staff and will result in speedier response time for out of state requests.
Four statewide preservation and conservation workshops were planned, scheduled and announced last month.
The new LSTA five year plan was completed and submitted to IMLS last month and we are awaiting their notice of approval.
Norma Blake, State Librarian, has instituted a “Blue Ribbon Task Force on the Future” to continue the groundbreaking work begun by the Mid-Atlantic Library Futures Conference. The State Library recognizes that it is imperative to have input from the people who are shaping the future of
New Jersey’s libraries. To serve on this panel, interested staff from NJ Libraries need only complete the application found at the New Jersey State Library website: http://www.njstatelib.org/News/news_item.php?item_id=674 and return it by August 15, 2007 to Peggy Cadigan.
· Get a Library Card Online allows potential library customers to register for a library card on the web. Get a Library Card Online was conceived by the South Jersey Regional Library Cooperative, which implemented a State Library funded pilot project, with 14 QandANJ participating libraries, to create and test this service. The pilot libraries have successfully used this new service for 18 months; more than 120 libraries are currently participating. Our goal is that all
New Jersey public libraries will make Get a Library Card Online available to their customers in the very near future. For more information see http://www.njstatelib.org/LDB/GALCO/.
· Update on NJKI Funding: The State of
New Jersey budget for FY08 will provide $2 million to continue the New Jersey Knowledge Initiative. This is one million dollars less than is needed to continue the program at its current level. The intent of the State Library and the NJKI Task Force is to continue all NJKI databases for as long as the $2 million will last, which we expect to be until February 28, 2008, assuming vendor/publisher agreement.
The New Jersey State Library had been planning a Futures Conference to try and determine who our future customers would be and how they would want their information delivered. The State Library felt that this conference would have more wide-ranging impact if we could make it bigger than just a statewide event. We developed partnerships with the state libraries of Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Maryland and Delaware and a regional library consortium, PALINET, and we presented a very successful conference, “The Mid-Atlantic Library Futures Conference” at the Borgata Hotel & Casino in Atlantic City, N.J., May 7 & 8, 2007. Holding a conference for librarians at a casino was the first extraordinary step we took in creating an event that would truly make its mark on our profession.
We were determined to hear from people outside of the library world – this became paramount in our planning process.
Our keynote speaker, Ray Kurzweil, amazed us with his vision of nanotechnology. Bob Treadway taught us about scenario building. We invited a demographer, Dr. James Hughes, Rutgers University, to show us how our world is changing, a cultural anthropologist (Mary Catherine Bateson, Margaret Mead’s daughter) to talk about aging and lifelong learning and noted architect Jeffrey Scherer, to show us how to create community centers in library spaces. Salvador Avila, from the Las Vegas, Clark County Library System, discussed the growing Hispanic population. Joan Frye Williams helped conference participants think about what they heard and try to apply the ideas to their libraries. Leslie Burger challenged the audience to take risks in order to evolve. There were close to 400 librarians in attendance and evaluations were uniformly enthusiastic. We are already committed to presenting a follow-up conference in fall 2008.
We searched for questions to ask our audience at our evening “World Café” that would stimulate discussion and found a question posed by Phil Bowermaster at his blog, www.speculist.com. The question we asked attendees was “If you live to be 100, what will be the biggest difference between the time you entered this world and the time you leave?” Phil Bowermaster became so interested in our conference that he attended the event. He participated fully, and even made three videos for us. The videos are posted on Norma Blake’s blog: www.njstatelib.org/blakesblog.
The State Library convened a follow-up meeting at Princeton Public Library on June 4, 2007, in response to e-mails requesting an opportunity for conference attendees to brainstorm. Fifty people participated in this follow-up meeting and spent hours discussing the ideas and concepts that intrigued them the most. Norma Blake took this opportunity to announce her “Blue Ribbon Task Force on the Future.” Members of the library community will have the opportunity to apply for a seat on the Task Force to advise the New Jersey State Library about how to turn the visions generated at the Futures Conference into reality.