Tales from a Loud Librarian

I was first published in print several years ago, but I haven't had much in the way of bylines since then. Until now. Below is a copy of the table of contents page for the current issue of Library Media Connection. The Gale TEAMS Award that we won in fall 2011 was also sponsored by LMC. The editorial staff asked if Lisa Valence and I would write an article describing the project that won us the award. If you have the current copy of LMC, you can read all about it on page 40. If you can't get a copy, click the link underneath the table of contents below to read a pdf version. One of my colleagues in Jefferson Parish, TerryYoung, has an article on page 14 in this edition, and it is all about STEM resources.  Collaboration is the Key to Successful Research

When Lisa Valence and I heard that we won the Gale TEAMS Award in September, we thought that we would receive $2500 and that would be it. Who knew this was an honor that would keep on giving and giving, even several months later. Gale Cengage sent us to the American Association of School Librarian's Conference in Minneapolis in October and held a reception there in our honor. We have a year's subscription to Library Media Connection magazine, and we are waiting to receive the cash award along with $500 in Gale products and some Linworth products, too. Library Media Connection asked us to write an article for their magazine describing the collaborative project that we submitted for the award.  The icing on the cake is this marvelous video that Gale had produced about Patrick Taylor Academy and the project that we designed to teach the social studies research paper. The video was shown at the Gale booth in the exhibit hall during the AASL conference (over and over ag...

We have been waiting and asking that the district add the news of the Gale Teams Award to the homepage of the website. Finally, they did. Here is a link to the article on the Jefferson Parish Schools website:  http://www.jppss.k12.la.us/district/news/Blog.aspx?id=2147506012&blogid=2147485652 .

 So much has happened in the last week. I don't know where to start. Attending the AASL conference in Minneapolis was a great experience. I have lots of ideas running through my head. I hope to implement some of them over the next couple of months. I need to make some decisions in my library on how to spend money on electronic books. I have a collection of over 350 reference in electronic format, but I want to start purchasing non-fiction titles that the students would use as supplemental material to their textbooks. During the conference I talked to Rosen Publishing about their ePoint Books and Follett about their Follett Shelf, and of course I can always add to to our existing Gale Virtual Reference Library.  There are some super-star librarians out there who are doing amazing things. Listening to them talk about all that they do means that some of them must never sleep. I got to meet a few of them during the conference, and I was really inspired by the information that the...