Many state standards require teaching students about award-winning books, which can be a daunting task considering the number of Caldecott Medal winners. This author, a library media specialist at Mill Creek Elementary in Statesboro, Georgia, describes an efficient, creative, and energizing strategy she devised that enabled her to teach the…

This report notes that although textbook prices comprise just one component of the price of attending college, such outlays are very frustrating to students and their parents. There has been a groundswell of criticisms against publishers, bookstores, and institutions of higher education that has translated into a mandate for action to make…

The practice of using a social network to establish and enhance relationships based on some common ground--shared interests, related skills, or a common geographic location--is as old as human societies, but social networking has flourished due to the ease of connecting on the Web. This OCLC membership report explores this web of social…

The "Victorian Free Library Service Board Act" of 1946 was the culmination of a long campaign to replace the mechanics' institute model of library provision with free libraries funded by state and local government. Given that library reform required legislation by the state government, this paper is mainly concerned with the political…

Since its humble beginning, Digital Past, a centralized local history digitization initiative at the North Suburban Library System (NSLS), a multitype consortium in Wheeling, Illinois, has now grown into a large centralized collaboration that consists of 32 libraries and a museum as its primary contributors. With Digital Past, there are various…

The environment is a great concern in the 1990s, and everyone needs to work at maintaining our planet. The 1992 Arizona State Library Reading Program, "Rainbow Earth," provides children with many techniques they can use to help the Earth. This reading program guide provides information on the following: goals, objectives, and evaluation;…

Stress and burnout are now recognized as serious problems in those fields generally referred to as the helping professions. Whatever the causes, stress and burnout impact on individuals and organizations. Librarianship has many aspects in common with other helping professions. Librarians serving youth face many of the same demands as do educators,…

The Adult New Reader Collection-Model Project proposed to serve five targeted groups by providing literacy, language development, and English-as-a-Second-Language (ESL) materials. The five groups included: literacy tutors; students identified by the staff and matched to their trained tutors; adult library users not connected to a literacy program…

The World Wide Web, with its captivating multimedia features and hypertext capabilities, has brought millions of new users to the Internet. Library staff who could create a home page on the Web could present basic information about the library and its services, showcase its resources, create links to quality material inside and outside the…

This book advises librarians, paraprofessional library supervisors, and library school students on problems unique to the management of serials. Chapter 1 explains the character and publication patterns of serials. Chapter 2 discusses the scope and the organizational structure of serials management, and the role of the serials manager. Chapter 3…

A study investigated access to books for children in schools that described their literacy curriculum as "literature-based." Six schools that served economically disadvantaged children exhibited a wide variation in the number of books available in both school libraries and classrooms. Two of the schools depict the influences on children's access…

The term "multimedia" is defined as the integration of text, audio sound, static graphic images, animations, and full motion video. Multimedia encompasses a number of components and levels of sophistication, and has come to denote the cutting edge of a technology that continues to change with unprecedented speed. Gaining a proficiency in…

The Systems and Procedures Exchange Center (SPEC) surveyed 119 Association of Research Libraries (ARL) members to gather information about current distance education and distance learning initiatives in ARL libraries. The objectives of the survey were to: (1) identify libraries involved in distance education activities and determine the extent or…

This document reports data for the law and medical components of the Association of Research Libraries (ARL) university libraries in the United States and Canada. Tables of summary data for collections, expenditures, and personnel and public services are presented separately for law and medical libraries by fiscal year. In addition, footnotes to…

Customer service is a vital part of library service. The reference interview remains a key element in assisting library patrons with information needs. This book shows librarians how to combine creativity with professional expertise in reference interviews, to provide quality customer service and satisfy patrons. The book is divided into 11…