Category Archives: CMLE

CMLE, Communication

Day Three of the CMLE Summer Fun Library Tour!

Does your community have a library bookmobile?

Bookmobiles are great! They can help you to reach out to community members who may not be easily served by your brick and mortar locations, they can be great PR for the library, and they are just fun.

Maybe you have a van. Or you might use one of those cool book bikes! Or you may have some other way of providing mobile library service.

But you probably do not have a bookmobile anything like this one!

knls camel library 9

The Camel Library in Kenya!

“The camel library service is an innovative initiative of the Kenya National Library Service that has won accolades for its efforts in promoting literacy and reading culture in arid and far flung regions of North Eastern Kenya. In this innovative initiative, camels carry books in boxes specifically made for the project and take them to children in far-flung schools. Also included in the boxes are tents and mats for children to use in the field.  This initiative has been successful in providing relevant books since inception and is an alternative to the motorised mobile library service available in other parts of the country.”

0knls camel library 1.2.3

knls camel library 1.2.4

Check this out:, CMLE

Day Two of the CMLE Summer Fun Library Tour!

Wiki uspsMany of the libraries in the CMLE system serve small and rural communities, as do many libraries across Minnesota. Wouldn’t  it be convenient to combine the great things libraries provide with the necessary services of the post office??

No need to dream about it: this already exists! (Yes: libraries are such cool places, other people want to join with us!!)

Village Post Offices

You can get their FAQs, and also find a list of post offices to use yourself!

“The U.S. Postal Service announced the concept of the Village Post Office in July 2011 as a way to continue providing convenient access to postal products and services in more rural communities across the nation.

The first Village Post Office (VPO) opened in Malone, WA, in August 2011. On Dec. 19, 2012, the100th VPO, located in Linden, IN, began operations.

  • VPOs are located within existing communities in a variety of locations, including convenience stores, local businesses and libraries, and are operated by the management of those locations.
  • VPOs offer a range of popular products and services — the ones most used by customers — including PO Boxes, Forever stamps, Pre-paid Priority Mail Flat Rate envelopes and a mail collection box.
  • By being located inside established businesses and other places consumers already frequent, VPOs offer Postal Service customers time-saving convenience, and in most cases, longer hours than regular Post Offices.
  • VPOs provide operators — in most cases, the local business owners — with opportunities for increased customer foot traffic and revenue, as well as providing additional services for their customers and clients.”

Here are our Minnesota Village Post Office locations – I’m not sure if any of these are in libraries, but it’s a possibility!

Badger VPO 201 N Main St Badger MN 56714 11/26/2013
Bejou VPO 218 Hwy 59 Bejou MN 56516 4/22/2014
Brooks VPO 106 Hwy 59 S Brooks MN 56715 11/22/2013
Buckman VPO 9394 Hwy 25 Buckman MN 56317 12/1/2013
Fifty Lakes VPO 40447 Town Hall Rd Fifty Lakes MN 56448 7/25/2014
Miltona VPO 233 Main St Miltona MN 56354 10/22/2014
Plummer VPO 131 Central Ave E Plummer MN 56748 3/15/2013
Red Lake Falls VPO 405 Bridge St Red Lake Falls MN 56750 5/15/2014
Rothsay VPO 106 2nd St SW Rothsay MN 56579 4/28/2014
Vergas VPO 105 E Main St Vergas MN 56587-0219 6/21/2013
Wahkon VPO 104 N Main Wahkon MN 56386 10/23/2014
Books, CMLE

Join us in June! New books for CMLE’s Goodreads Book Groups

New month, new books to read in CMLE’s two Goodreads Book Groups! We hope you are able to join us. Maybe you will even be able to find some time to read outside while enjoying the summer sun!

In our CMLE Librarians Enjoying Books group we will be reading The Invisible Library by Genevieve Cogman.
“The first installment of an adventure featuring stolen books, secret agents and forbidden societies – think Doctor Who with librarian spies!”

 

 

For our CMLE Librarian Professionals group, we’ll read The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business by Charles Duhigg.
“With penetrating intelligence and an ability to distill vast amounts of information into engrossing narratives, Duhigg brings to life a whole new understanding of human nature and its potential for transformation.”

CMLE, Programs, Resources, Tech

Day One of the CMLE Summer Fun Library Tour!

Did you watch Phineas and Ferb? If so, you are already familiar with the concept of having a summer filled with cool things! You only have so long until summer is over, so let’s make the most of it!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xf3mRZ7SHu0

While we can not guarantee creating nanobots, giving monkeys showers, surfing tidal waves, or even climbing the Eiffel Tower, we do want to share some fun library facts and ideas.

Look for a daily series of quick posts with library trivia, programs, and models to make us all laugh, or to give everyone ideas you might want to try out this fall! The library field is filled with all sorts of interesting things – and we plan to explore them this summer.

If you have suggestions for fun library things this summer, send them in or post them to the comments below!

What will we have created by the time fall rolls around?? Who knows?? But hopefully we will all have had some library fun!

 

Day One of the CMLE Summer Library Tour:

Have you had to clean dirty books?? It’s never fun! But check out this machine that does the hard part for you!

The machine is from Italy, and is being used right now at the Boston Public Library!(Check their cute, short video!)

CMLE, Communication

Check Out Our Latest Podcast: Local History!

Local History room

This week is our thirteenth episode – and it’s a lucky one!

(You can download all our podcasts at iTunes or the podcast app of your choice; or you can listen to this episode here!)

Topic of the Week: Local History Collections

 

RUSA Guidelines for Establishing Local History Collections http://www.ala.org/rusa/resources/guidelines/guidelinesestablishing

  • Considerations before making a commitment to developing a local history collection
    • Research and understand the history that is unique to the locality.
    • Establish and maintain a dialog between local institutions (museums, academic libraries, local archives), societies (both genealogical and historical), and agencies (county, city, and state). Consider what is currently being collected, what services are needed, to what depth such collections are being developed, and what collaborative or cooperative agreements are needed. Determine the most suitable repository for particular materials with respect to use, dissemination, and preservation.
      • Scope and Services of the Collection
      • Collection Development
      • Collection Location and Access
      • Fiscal Considerations
        • Provide a budget for staffing the collection.
        • Provide a budget sufficient to acquire, process, and preserve the local history collection.
        • Provide a budget for physical and bibliographic access to the collection.
        • Provide a budget for reproduction, reformatting, and/or digitization of rare and fragile materials.
        • Provide a budget for public relations.
        • Develop a policy for a reproduction fee schedule.

 

We have a lot of information on our website about some of the great libraries we looked at this week, and more about some interesting genealogy resources, as well as our report on books we are reading, and our Spotlight Library of the Week!

Next week we have special guest hosts for our look at Special Libraries, so check that out on Thursday, June 8!