Welcome back to Browsing Books! Let’s explore some summer time reading.

We are the Central Minnesota Libraries Exchange, a multitype system serving all types of libraries.

This season we are suggesting books you might enjoy for our Goodreads group: Armchair Travel to Minnesota State Parks. We give you a prompt connected to each state park, and you find a book to fulfill the challenge. You can use one of our suggestions, and you should feel free to read any book!

Split Rock Creek State Park is in the Pipestone area of the state. (Don’t be confused with the very similarly named Split Rock park!)

This is the largest body of water in Pipestone County, an area famous for indigenous peoples coming to this area to gather. Let’s celebrate the history by reading a book about gatherings of people!

We give you links to each of these books on our show notes page, taking you to Amazon.com. If you click on any of them, and buy anything at all – including a nice book – Amazon will send us a small percent of the profits they made on these sales. Thank you for supporting CMLE!

Thanks for joining us! We’ll be back next week with a look at the next park and the next book prompt!

“One Book | One Minnesota is a statewide book club that invites Minnesotans of all ages to read a common title and come together virtually to enjoy, reflect, and discuss.

Libraries are essential for connection, and through One Book | One Minnesota, libraries across the state will connect their communities through stories. The program aims to bring Minnesotans closer together during this time of distance and adversity.

Just Announced: One Book Second Chapter | Summer 2020

The featured book for Summer 2020 is A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota, edited by Sun Yung Shin (Minnesota Historical Society Press). Ebooks and resources will be available soon.

Welcome to the second chapter of One Book | One Minnesota. When we started this program two months ago with Because of Winn-Dixie, it was in response to the isolation and resource gaps created by the COVID-19 pandemic. Our desire was to bring Minnesotans together to share in the collective joy of reading and come together as a virtual community.

Since then, the Minneapolis police murdered George Floyd, and led by Black community members and activists, the world erupted in grief, protest, and perhaps finally a reckoning that we must confront institutional and systemic racism – and that means all of us. Reading this book in community offers some Minnesotans the opportunity to see their experiences broadly shared and others a chance to educate themselves—and to discover ways to act on their convictions.

We are fortunate that Minnesota is home to many talented writers whose work can inform and guide us on this journey. In 2016, the Minnesota Historical Society Press published a series of essays by Native writers and writers of color in Minnesota entitled A Good Time for the Truth: Race in Minnesota, edited by Sun Yung Shin. We are grateful and proud to bring this book forward for the second chapter of One Book | One Minnesota.Read our full statement here.Expand

One Book | One Minnesota is presented by The Friends of the Saint Paul Public Library, as the Minnesota Center for the Book, in partnership with State Library Services. Program partners also include Council of Regional Public Library System Administrators, Minitex (a joint program of the University of Minnesota and the Minnesota Office of Higher Education), the Minnesota Department of Education, and Minnesota Historical Society Press. “

Explore their website for more resources you can use to promote and share this book group across your community!

The IMLS is our federal agency, providing information and funding to libraries across the country. (Our VR/AR kits came from IMLS funding!) We are passing on their material on safety research in reopening the libraries.

“Findings are Part of REALM Project to ProduceScience-Based Information to Help Mitigate Exposure to Virus

Washington, DC— In the first phase of a project to disseminate and develop science-based information about how materials can be handled to mitigate exposure to staff and visitors, scientists have found that the virus SARS-CoV-2 that causes COVID-19 is not detectable on five common library materials after three days.

The findings are part of the Reopening Archives, Libraries, and Museums (REALM) Project designed to generate scientific information to support the handling of core museum, library, and archival materials as these institutions begin to resume operations and reopen to the public. The first phase of the research is focusing on commonly found and frequently handled materials, especially in U.S. public libraries. 

Over the past few weeks, scientists at Battelle tested the virus on a variety of surfaces, in environments with standard temperature and relative humidity conditions typically found in air-conditioned office space. Materials tested in phase one included the cover of hardcover books (buckram cloth), the cover of softback books, plain paper pages inside a closed book, mylar protective book cover jackets, and plastic DVD cases. Battelle tests found the virus undetectable after one day on the covers of hardback and softback books as well as the DVD case. The virus was undetectable on the paper inside of a book and mylar book jackets after three days. “It’s below the limit of detection on our viability assay,” said Battelle Principal Research Scientist Will Richter.

Lab testing of physical items followed literature reviews conducted by Battelle to help define the scope of the project’s research and the information needs of libraries, archives, and museums. Last week, the REALM Project released “Systematic Literature Review of SARS-CoV-2: Spread, Environmental Attenuation, Prevention, and Decontamination,” prepared by Battelle. This is an in-depth review of published literature on virus transmission, attenuation, and decontamination methods that can inform discussion and decisions about operations in archives, libraries, and museums. 

“Scientific research is essential to answer questions about the spread of the coronavirus on materials that are ever-present in our nation’s libraries, archives, and museums,” said IMLS Director Crosby Kemper. “We recognized the need to test specific items and surfaces as these organizations are now reopening, asking: How can we mitigate risk to staff? How should patrons and visitors handle books, touchable exhibits, or DVD cases? Our aim was to equip America’s libraries, archives, and museums with information to help them do what they do best: continue serving their communities. I am so pleased and hopeful that this critical work will be reaching the people who need it.”

“Results from this ongoing research project will help libraries, archives and museums plan with greater confidence at a difficult time,” said Skip Prichard, OCLC President and CEO. “Although there are various sources of general information about handling materials in the time of COVID-19, this project is designed specifically to test materials and provide useful science-based information to these institutions. Equipped with this critical information, they will be better able to determine measures they can take to mitigate exposure to staff and the communities they serve.” 

“Any library worker would agree that people make good decisions when their decisions are based on facts and evidence,” said Nate Hill, Executive Director, Metropolitan New York Library Council and member of the REALM Project Steering Committee. “The output of the REALM Project, both the systematic literature review and the lab test results, give library workers the information they need to make practical, informed decisions as they reopen their spaces and resume their services.”

Battelle will be initiating lab testing on an additional five materials this month, with results expected by the end of July. Examples of public library reopening plans are being collected, curated, and shared to the website this week. The research reports will inform development of toolkit resources, content, and programming that will help translate the findings for real-world applications in museums, libraries, and archives.

“As museums across the country draft their reopening plans, we know that our exhibitions and galleries contain a vast variety of materials that are not addressed in state and federal public health guidelines,” said Carole Charnow, President and Chief Executive Officer, Boston Children’s Museum and member of the REALM Operations Working Group. “Therefore, we need up to date, science-based information specific to museums. For those of us that are hands-on, interactive institutions, this is especially critical. The REALM Project is providing the invaluable evidence-based information museum professionals need in order to ensure the highest possible standards of safety for our staff and visitors.”

The REALM Project is supported by the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), the primary source of federal funding for museums and libraries; and OCLC, a nonprofit library technology and research organization; in partnership with Battelle, a not-for-profit global scientific research and development organization.

Project updates are posted at oc.lc/realm-project as they become available.

Those interested can also sign up through the project website to receive timely email updates when new information is released.  

We know that too many of our members have been furloughed, with some jobs being eliminated entirely. This is bad news for the individuals, for their colleagues, and very bad news for students and other community members who are missing out on the opportunity to experience a good library.

We are sharing an excerpt from this article from American Libraries Magazine, looking at some of the things lost in a furlough.

“One of the biggest challenges—the effect on morale—is heightened when furloughs arrive with little warning, little support, or both.

“Communication has been terrible. We are actually finding out more from the news than from our own admins,” says Cara*, an assistant at a branch library in Tennessee who was furloughed the week of March 20 along with almost all of her colleagues across her library system.

While Cara’s direct supervisor is checking in with her regularly during the furlough, she says, senior system administrators are not in contact with individual branches: “We’ve just had no support. No kind emails saying, ‘We’ll get through this.’ No checking in. My supervisor has no idea what’s going on either. I don’t like turning to the gossip mill for information.”

Cara adds that she wished her library’s board had considered the furloughs with more compassion and empathy. “I’m not saying that I needed someone to hold my hand or anything like that, but an attempt at some humanity would have helped,” she says. “Just to feel like we’re all in this together would have been nice. But we aren’t.”

Before the mid-March meeting in which Jorge*, a library director in northwest Chicago, was furloughed, his library board hadn’t mentioned the possibility to him, he says.

“It came out of nowhere,” he says. “The meeting started, my assistant and I were told to leave the room, and when we came back, we were told [my staff and I] were furloughed. I was thrown under the bus.” Jorge’s assistant, the only employee kept on payroll, was tasked with calling staff to relay the additional layoffs.

Fortunately, Jorge was able to retain his existing part-time position at a different library as well as successfully apply for unemployment benefits during the furlough. His furlough concluded at the end of May, but his challenges didn’t: He was given one week, he says, to reopen for curbside service. He says he eventually convinced the board to bring back all staff members to assist in reopening efforts. “Honestly, I can’t run a library without a staff,” he says.”

You can read the rest of this article here.

Furloughs are not uncommon in different libraries and in hard economic situations; but handling them well is so important.

We are having an exciting time, where people everywhere are becoming more interested in reading books to help us all develop a better sense of community. And of course, this includes younger readers too!

So, we are sharing suggestions from the School Library Journal. You can use them to help build your library’s collection, or add them to your personal reading collection for yourself and/or your younger readers at home.

You can read the entire article here.

“Learning to recognize and combat racism and other forms of injustice and move toward a more equitable world is a lifelong process—and one that must start as early as possible. Aimed at infants and toddlers through elementary school students, these titles introduce topics such as intersectionality and privilege, with explanations that are age-appropriate and honest.

Looking for more summer reading recommendations? SLJ is publishing lists all summer long—from family stories to mysteries to teen reads. 

Woke: A Young Poet’s Call to Justice by Mahogany L. Browne & others. illus. by Theodore Taylor III. Roaring Brook. ISBN 9781250311207.

The team behind Woke Baby introduce concepts and explains issues that concern activists of all ages. These 24 poems celebrate diversity and individuality, touching on issues of gender, physical ability, race, immigration, and protest, as well as the complex web of discrimination and systemic oppression that impacts many marginalized people. The message is clear: We must fight against injustice, and our words can be our greatest source of power.

An ABC of Equality by Chana Ginelle Ewing. illus. by Paulina Morgan. Quarto/Frances Lincoln. ISBN 9781786037428.

Many people must consciously unlearn the system of beliefs imposed by parents, authority figures, and the overall dominant culture. Ewing’s colorful, sunny board book takes such nebulous ideas and packages them into an easily digestible vocabulary bank for young readers. Highly recommended for school and public libraries and can serve as an entry point into social justice literature.

Not My Idea: A Book About Whiteness by Anastasia Higginbotham. illus. by author. Dottir. ISBN 9781948340007.

In this call to action, a young white child catches news fragments of a police officer shooting an unarmed black man, then witness their family members’ discomfort and avoidance of the topic (“We don’t see color”). The child’s confusion leads them to the library for answers about the history of racism in the United States. Employing age-appropriate language and direct explanations, this is an essential text for young readers, and adults, unfamiliar or uncomfortable with the role of white people in dismantling racism.”

You can read the rest of this article here. Enjoy your reading!