Category Archives: Public

General, Public, Special

Instagram & marbled paper

nature patternMost book-lovers agree that print books have a certain beauty, and some even enjoy the smell of a book, library, or bookstore. But have you ever heard of marbled book art?

The American Antiquarian Society has been sharing the beauty of this ancient art form over their Instagram feed, and their feature #MarbledMonday has become very popular. This art form used on historical book bindings is undeniably beautifully artistic – the papers, edges, and cloths of these books are enhanced with colors and swirling patterns and shapes. Another reason for the popularity of this feature is the fact that artists in the 18th and 19th century produced these complicated patterns without the help of modern equipment!

The way these designs are produced is by placing chemicals and pigments in a water bath, then the artist manipulates the floating pigments to create patterns, which are then put onto the book edges or papers.

In the early days of America, even currency was marbled to prevent counterfeiting! Check out the full article here for more examples and pictures.

Image credit: https://unsplash.com/(Sebastian Unrau), licensed under CC0 1.0

 

Academic, General, Public, School Media Specialist

Where have the media specialists gone?

Editors note: This post could be the last in this annual series. Why? As sometimes happens, what is happening in the field can get ahead of the state education department, and the way that data is collected. From our work in the field, we witness an increase in the number of school media specialists being reassigned to new titles and new duties.  Tech Integrationist or Digital Resource Specialist, Guide, or Coach are some of the assigned titles. It is unclear to us at CMLE how personnel in 265 schools are being reported to MDE; questioning the validity of our data set.

Q is for Question MarkCould you hear us crunching the data? This is the sixth year that CMLE has been pulling the Minnesota Department of Education (MDE) data and studying the slow decline of school library media specialists in our CMLE twelve-county region. Sharing the data is (was) the logical thing to do, but CMLE has found little appetite from the field in addressing this issue. Even those in the field feel unable to propose ideas, and the perennial question is: Whose problem is this to solve? CMLE can serve as a voice for school media centers, but has no authority or power to correct this lack of high quality staffing.

It stands to reason that if there is inadequate media specialist staffing in high schools, students may not be prepared with the skills they need to be successful in college. Will middle schoolers be prepared to do high school work, and when students have no library program at school, are they simply going to the public library for assistance? Are the public libraries funded or staffed to absorb this work on a large scale? Everyone is stretched for resources, so it is critical that K-12, public, and academic libraries all step up to do their part. Do school superintendents understand this? It amazes me that the public and academic libraries don’t push back when they are forced to pick up the additional weight as a result of this dodged responsibility. Is this fair, is this right?

Without further ado, here is data for Aitkin, Benton, Chisago, Isanti, Kanabec, Mille Lacs, Morrison, Pine, Sherburne, Stearns, Todd and Wright counties in MN. In a nutshell, …..

  • 97 individual schools (45%) in Central MN have no licensed media specialist. This compares with 90 in 2015, 79 individual schools in 2014, 53 in 2013, and 48 in 2012.
  • 52% of the schools without a media specialist are middle, secondary, or high schools. A whopping 76% of secondary schools are functioning without licensed staff!
  • 47 elementary schools have no media specialist (compared to 43 last year, 38 in 2014 and 28 in 2013), yet as far as I know, we are still focused statewide on demonstrating reading proficiency by 3rd grade!
  • 18 out of 52 districts (35%) have no media specialist in any school in the district. This compares to 16 in 2014 & 2015, 14 in 2013, and 9 in 2012!
  • Is there any good news? Yes. The great news is that 35% of CMLE schools still have a full time media specialist, a number which is holding. Schools with a full-blown school media program appear to value it, and see the need.

According to public 2015-2016 MDE data, here are the CMLE school districts with no licensed media specialists in any school: Aitkin, Annandale, Belgrade-Brooten-Elrosa, Bertha Hewitt, Braham, Browerville, Eagle Valley, East Central, Foley, Hinckley-Finlayson, Kimball, Long Prairie-Grey Eagle, Maple Lake, McGregor, Royalton, Staples-Motley, Swanville, and Willow River. Are parents in these districts aware of this issue?

New to the list this year are shown in orange. Congratulations to Onamia, who graduated off this list!

In the past, CMLE used this data in its advocacy work, in targeting its programming, and in working statewide to bring attention to this growing problem.  All Minnesota students deserve a high quality, K-12 academic experience that prepares them for the next step in their life. We need students to be able to proficiently use the research process and to think critically about competing sources of information. These are key lifelong skills needed by all high-functioning members of society.

Patricia Post
CMLE Executive Director

Image credit: http://tinyurl.com/mklc22b, licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0
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