Welcome, everyone, to our final episode of Season Five of Reading With Libraries! 

It has been so great to read with you for these fifteen weeks – we just can’t bear for our book fun to end. So while we are on hiatus you will get a Browsing Books quick episode each week. You can follow our Goodreads book challenge: Armchair Travel to Minnesota State Parks. We give you a book prompt for each state park, to highlight something neat at the park.

Here is our full show notes page.

This week we are discussing a favorite topic: Minnesota books! We will look at book set in Minnesota, and books by Minnesota authors. This is always our season finale topic, because we know there are 10,000 lakes here and at least as many good stories!

Who is joining us today? We are welcoming back our frequent Alternate Host Ariel Kirst, from the Great River Public Library system!

Thanks for joining us today! Come back next week for the next book discussion!

At CMLE we have our own Official Office Dog, Lady Grey. She’s great! We are also big fans of pets in libraries – for stress prevention and for other occasions.

So when we hear about Horatio, we had to share him with you! Check out this article excerpt and you can read the whole thing here.

This is one of their photos – so cute!

“Every “Caturday,” bibliographic services assistant Lisa Shaffer debuts another one of the hilariously elaborate costumes she makes for her adorable cat Horatio. While this tradition may seem a little unusual, she’s doing it for the best of reasons.

Lisa works for Centre County Library in Bellefonte, Pennsylvania. A few years ago, she noticed they had little to no social media presence, so she set out to make a change.

Knowing how much the Internet loves all things feline, Lisa approached her supervisor and asked if she could share pictures of her cats dressed up as famous characters from literature and pop culture. After getting the green light, the creative library employee got to work making her vision a reality!

Lisa works for Centre County Library in Bellefonte, Pennsylvania. A few years ago, she noticed they had little to no social media presence, so she set out to make a change.

Knowing how much the Internet loves all things feline, Lisa approached her supervisor and asked if she could share pictures of her cats dressed up as famous characters from literature and pop culture. After getting the green light, the creative library employee got to work making her vision a reality!

“I just started taking books, random books that would be interesting to highlight,” she said. “Or if it was an author’s birthday or anniversary of some event, I would get a picture of one of my cats, mostly Horatio, and it just kind of went from there.””

You can get all the pictures and the rest of the article right here!

School libraries: this is a really cool opportunity to bring a program to your school! If you want to give it a try, but want to consider some ideas or maybe partner with some other schools – let us know! We can help you set up your application.

Check out this press release from the AASL for all the information:

“CHICAGO – The American Association of School Librarians (AASL) is partnering with StoryCorps to launch StoryCorps Connect. The new free platform allows Americans to conduct and record StoryCorps interviews remotely. AASL encourages school librarians to utilize the technology to support learners in connecting with others amidst the COVID-19 pandemic and, in the process, to contribute to the creation of a unique first-person historical record of this unprecedented crisis.

“We at AASL are thrilled to partner with StoryCorps,” said AASL President Mary Keeling. “This platform empowers our learners to reach out to family members to record first-person narratives about the pandemic. As they inquire into the life experiences of their loved ones, they will be curating primary source material that will be invaluable for researchers in the future. School librarians can also use this platform to interview educators and fellow librarians about how we adjusted our practices to transform learning while schools have been shut down.”

StoryCorps Connect is a public service platform to bring people together amidst a global public health crisis. StoryCorps Connect uses advanced online videoconferencing technology and wraparound instructional tools to give participants a free, high-quality platform to record StoryCorps conversations remotely. The organization began developing StoryCorps Connect in March in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, motivated by the belief that at this time of physical separation, StoryCorps can provide a critical public service to increase connection to others and reduce the impact of isolation.

Dave Isay, Founder and President of StoryCorps, said, “Social distancing is the exact opposite of the StoryCorps ethos, which strives to bring people together and acknowledge and celebrate our common humanity. At this time of physical separation, the StoryCorps interview methodology is a more essential tool than ever before for bringing us together.”

StoryCorps is the national non-profit organization dedicated to recording, preserving, and sharing the stories of people of all backgrounds and beliefs. Conversations recorded are preserved for future generations at the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress and become instantly accessible and shareable through the StoryCorps Archive. Founded in 2003, StoryCorps has brought more than 600,000 Americans together—two at a time—to record intimate, face-to-face conversations about their lives, create human connection, pass wisdom from one generation to the next, and leave a legacy for the future. It is the largest single collection of voices ever gathered.

StoryCorps is working with national partners, including AASL, and with public media organizations, school districts, teachers, and others across the country to bring StoryCorps Connect to the American people, and to call on the country to honor the stories of our elders at this momentous point in our history. While StoryCorps is a U.S.-based effort, StoryCorps Connect interviews can be conducted by anyone, anywhere in the world.

To assist school library professionals in the usage of the site, AASL and StoryCorps collaborated to produce the webinar “How to Use StoryCorps Connect as a School Librarian.” During the webinar, Isay and members of the StoryCorps team share how to effectively record a StoryCorps Connect interview and how to use StoryCorps Connect to engage the school community. The archive is freely available on the AASL Learning Library.

About AASL
The American Association of School Librarians, www.aasl.org, a division of the American Library Association (ALA), empowers leaders to transform teaching and learning.

About StoryCorps
Founded in 2003 by Dave Isay, StoryCorps has given people of all backgrounds and beliefs, in thousands of towns and cities in all 50 states, the chance to record interviews about their lives. The organization preserves the recordings in its archive at the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress, the largest single collection of human voices ever gathered, and shares select stories with the public through StoryCorps’ podcast, NPR broadcasts, animated shorts, digital platforms, and best-selling books. These powerful human stories reflect the vast range of American experiences, wisdom and values; engender empathy and connection; and remind us how much more we have in common than what divides us.”

We are the Central Minnesota Libraries Exchange, a multitype library 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!

Beaver Creek Valley State Park was established in 1937.There are a lot of activities to do in this park, including Guided audio tour of the Beaver Creek Trail.

Celebrate the name of this park, and read a book about a small mammal, preferably a beaver OR about a dam.

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!

School library people: this could be a great grant for you!

If you were thinking about applying, but not sure where to start, we are here to help you with it.

Check out this press release with information from the ALA!

“CHICAGO – The American Library Association (ALA) is pleased to partner with the Women’s Suffrage Centennial Commission (WSCC) to distribute 6,000 women’s suffrage youth book sets to libraries across the country. Public and school libraries are encouraged to apply for the book sets by June 15, 2020.

This generous donation celebrates the 100th anniversary of the ratification of the 19th amendment and highlights the importance of libraries as hubs of civic education and engagement.

Created by Congress to mark the centennial of women’s suffrage, WSCC selected the books and is providing funding for the project. Each set consists of three books corresponding to different reading levels: “Around America to Win the Vote” by Mara Rockliff for elementary readers; “The Woman’s Hour: Our Fight for the Right to Vote” by Elaine Weiss for middle schoolers; and the “National Park Service Women’s Suffrage Reader,” an anthology of essays for high school readers.

A working group representing members and staff from ALA’s offices and three youth divisions—American Association of School Librarians , Association for Library Service to Children, and Young Adult Library Services Association —will field the requests and have created a recommended list of diverse books, as well as program and display ideas to accompany the book donations. In addition, ALA and the WSCC will co-host a series of virtual women’s suffrage herstory times.

ALA and the WSCC look forward to getting books to libraries and into the hands of young readers, and to commemorating the diverse suffragists on whose shoulders we stand today.

Contact Jazzy Celindro, jcelindro@ala.org, for more information about the project or with questions about the application.

About the American Library Association
The American Library Association (ALA) is the foremost national organization providing resources to inspire library and information professionals to transform their communities through essential programs and services. For more than 140 years, the ALA has been the trusted voice for academic, public, school, government and special libraries, advocating for the profession and the library’s role in enhancing learning and ensuring access to information for all. For more information, visit ala.org.

About the Women’s Suffrage Centennial Commission
The Women’s Suffrage Centennial Commission was created by Congress to coordinate the nationwide commemoration of the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment and women’s constitutional right to vote in 2020. Led by a bipartisan group of women leaders, the WSCC has a nonpartisan mission to make sure Americans across the country have the chance to participate in centennial commemorations and to learn about this important but often overlooked history. Through digital events, educational programs, media campaigns, and collaborative partnerships, the WSCC is working to ensure that the centennial is honored nationwide. Learn more about the centennial and the WSCC on our website, www.womensvote100.org“