Category Archives: Academic

Academic, General, School Media Specialist

Amazon to provide Ebooks in NYC schools

a.com_logo_RGBIt was recently announced that Amazon won a contract with the New York City Department of Education to provide Ebooks to NYC schools. Some see this as a surprise move by the online company but others wonder what took Amazon so long to move into Education. Initially the agreement will be a 3 year contract worth $30 million and supply just digital content through an internal marketplace but not Kindle e-readers.

Time will tell how this will affect the education Ebook market. Could this be another niche for Amazon or just a money making venture? Could it be good for students and educators?

Others are more skeptical of the contract citing privacy concerns. Details surrounding student information are still being determined. Regardless, schools serving up Ebooks will have to pay attention to see how this evolves because Amazon may soon be the company providing their e-content.

Image credit: amazon.com
Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist, Special

Nine mobile Google calendar tricks

sumall_calendar_email_campaignDo you live by your calendar? With birthday reminders, meetings, events, and the ability to always be accessible, the modern, mobile calendar is far different than the wall version of old. And to make your mobile calendar even more of an asset, PCWorld recently highlighted 9 ways to make the most of your Google calendar for android and iOS. The list is full of tips and tricks, but also details some of the lesser known features of the mobile version of Google calendar. Here’s the abbreviated list but make sure to check out all the details now!

  1. Let Calendar’s event editor fill in the blanks
  2. Set a default duration for your events
  3. Add automatic alarms for your events
  4. Set up repeating events
  5. Show more calendar events on the screen
  6. Pick new colors for your calendars and events
  7. Set aside some “me time”
  8. Start the week on a day other than Sunday
  9. Quickly delete an event or check off a to-do
Image from SumAll - Free Marketing Images
Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist, Special

Library legislative update: 5/15/16

State CapitolThe following legislative updates were written by Elaine Keefe, library lobbyist for the Minnesota Library Association (MLA) and Information Technology Educators of MN (ITEM). CMLE helps pay this lobbyist to serve the best interests of academic, K-12, public, and special libraries in Central MN. (Latest information is at the top)

Received Tuesday, May 18, 2016 at 1:19 a.m.
Good news!  The House is scheduled to release its bonding bill tomorrow morning (May18), and it will include $2 million for Library Construction Grants.  This is great news, given that the total House bonding proposal is slightly under $800 million.  Thank you to all of you who contacted your representatives to ask them to include funding for Library Construction Grants in the bonding bill!

Received Sunday, May 15, 2016 at 4:19 PM

End of Session Negotiations:  The legislative session is nearing the end.  Legislators must adjourn no later than Monday, May 23.  Since they cannot pass bills on the final day, time is running short for Governor Dayton and legislative leaders to reach agreement on transportation, taxes, a supplemental budget bill and a bonding bill.  They met twice last week and so far all they have agreed upon is that they want to reach an agreement on a transportation package before working on the other three bills.  Governor Dayton plans to present a compromise proposal on Monday.

Bonding Bill:  The Senate’s bonding bill, which spent a total of $1.8 billion, failed on the Senate floor by 1 vote.  Bonding bills require a supermajority of 3/5, which means 41 votes are needed to pass the Senate.  The bill only received 40 votes.  Only 1 Republican, Senator Carla Nelson of Rochester, voted for the bill.

During the debate Republicans offered a bonding bill of their own, which spent $992 million.  It cut funding for Library Construction Grants to $1 million and eliminated funding for the new East Central Regional Library headquarters/Cambridge Library and the Bagley Public Library.  The proposal only garnered 18 votes.

House Republicans still have not brought forward a bonding bill.  They originally said they wanted to spend only $600 million, but Speaker Daudt admitted to reporters that a bill of that size will not get the 81 votes needed to pass the House.  This prompted Senate Majority Leader Bakk to observe that the Senate bill is too big to pass and the House bill is too small to pass.  If a bonding bill does pass this session, it will need to be somewhere in between.

A bill significantly smaller than the Senate bill with more emphasis on transportation projects is likely to come out of the House, and that could mean no funding for Library Construction Grants.  Now is the time for members of the House to hear from you.

PLEASE contact your representatives in the House and urge them to make sure that Library Construction Grants are included in the House bonding bill!

 Supplemental Budget (HF 2749):  A ten member conference committee is negotiating a 600 page omnibus supplemental budget bill.  The conferees met three times last week to have staff walk through a side by side comparison of the provisions in the House and Senate bills.  Another meeting is scheduled for 6pm tonight (Sunday).  Negotiations on budget items cannot get serious until Governor Dayton and legislative leaders agree on how much spending will be included in the bill.  That will depend on how much is spent on transportation, which is being negotiated in a separate conference committee.  As a reminder, the items we are following in the supplemental budget conference committee are Border to Border Broadband grants, K-12 broadband grants, total operating capital and after school funding.  See my April 29 update for details.

Elaine Keefe
Capitol Hill Associates
525 Park Street, Suite 255
St. Paul, MN 55103
(cell) 612-590-1244
elaine@capitolhillassoc.com

Image credit: http://tinyurl.com/oddkzbj, licensed under CC BY-NC-SA 2.0

 

Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist, Special

The 2016 State of America's Libraries report

Library of historic photo booksAccording to the introduction of this year’s report….”Libraries today are less about what they have for people and more about what they do for and with people. Library professionals promote opportunities for individuals and progress for communities. Libraries of all kinds add value in five key areas (the E’s of Libraries): education, employment, entrepreneurship, empowerment, and engagement. They are advancing the legacy of reading and developing a digitally inclusive society.” Below are a few links to help you quickly get at the parts of this report that have meaning for you.

Image credit: http://tinyurl.com/jvm4ghy, licensed under CC BY-NC 2.0

 

 

Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist, Special

Featured Book: May Day

May DayThis post is part of an original series created by librarians/media specialists across Central Minnesota featuring books.

Title: May Day by Jess Lourey
Review by: Angie Gentile-Jordan, Office Administrator at CMLE

Our event on May 5th featured a talk from author and professor Jess Lourey. Before the event, in an attempt to familiarize myself with her work, I began reading May Day, the first in her popular Murder-by-Month series.

The book is about assistant librarian Mira James, who moves to the small town of Battle Lake, MN from the big city of Minneapolis as a way to get a fresh start on her post-grad life. As she settles in, she encounters many characters that will be familiar to readers that have spent any amount of time in small-town Minnesota.

All seems to be going well for Mira. She even begins casually dating an archaeologist visiting the town on business. But when his lifeless body shows up (she stumbles across it in the library, no less!) Mira decides to find some answers.

I enjoyed reading this book for several reasons: the tone was light and clever, and I could picture many of the scenes playing out in northern Minnesota. I liked the way Mira bluffed her way through conversations about fishing to gain trust with the locals, throwing out words like “pan fish” not having any idea what it meant.

I’ve already purchased the next in the series, June Bug, and am looking forward to reading it from the boat while doing a little pan fishing of my own!