Bright Spot Awards

Hello, Everyone
Starting this week, I'm going to highlight a Bright Spot staff member or team who really made a difference, whether it's through patron service, teamwork, or making the library proud. On the heels of the city's annual Spelling Bee, the first week's award has to go to the dynamic team of Lynn Allen, Jill Miatech, Ed Godula, and Amy Klein. Their performance was simply stunning. Even more stunning was the teamwork they demonstrated. Every member of the team committed to memorizing a portion of the word list, and every member came through on their commitment. To say that we are proud is an understatement.
Congratulations, Kenosha Spelling Bee Champs!!! Congratulations, KPL!
Thanks also to Don Cress who donated 10 tickets to KPL staff so we could cheer our team on!

Here's other news:

• Thanks to our CNS staff for a painless Internet upgrade this week!
• Credit card payments will soon be available on self check machines at NS. Lin will provide instructions and training.
• Thanks to everyone who attended the safety meetings at Simmons and Uptown. We will be adding cameras at Uptown to increase security there. 
• We're working hard on piecing together the funding for the new mini-bookmobile. We hope to get the vehicle on the road by the start of the school year.
• We'll be heavily involved in leading the city's summer parks program again this year. Jill is leading the charge on this year's efforts in Lincoln Park, Roosevelt School, and EBSOLA.
• The Board's Personnel and Finance Committee will propose a "living wage" resolution at the next full Board meeting on May 8th. The proposal sets the minimum hourly wage for KPL staff at $11.01 per hour, based on a Living Wage Index from MIT. If you would like to provide public comments to the board on this decision, you are encouraged to attend the May 8th board meeting at 5:30pm at SW. Public comments are one way, not question and answer periods. If you have questions, please send them to me in advance and I can make sure that they are answered beforehand.
• We will be conducting a wage survey through a consultant firm this year that will analyze our pay structure and adjust, if necessary. This will be part of the annual budgeting process. Implementation of the recommendations are likely to be funded no earlier than 2019.
• Watertown Public Library is bringing a team to tour our Youth Services areas on Monday as they plan renovations of their library. Please welcome them to KPL.
• The Wisconsin Public Library Assn annual conference in Pewaukee happens May 2-4, so expect a few of us to be out of the building during that time.
• The Wisconsin Marathon will take over the Library Park area next Friday and Saturday. Simmons will maintain regular hours. Patrons and staff may need to use the Women's Club parking lot.

Lin and I are both out on Monday. Anne is your point person to take care of any big emergencies.

Have a lovely weekend, everyone!

Barb

Your Championship Team!!

Congratulations, Team of Geniuses!
Thanks for making us so very proud!!

Power Libraries and Other Good Ideas

Where is the Power Library Award and film, you might ask?
The award arrived broken in Atlanta, so I received a dummy on stage. As soon as the new engraved perfect one arrives, we'll pass it through the libraries to show off. It's really pretty!
And the film? We're keeping that until we have all our celebration planned. You'll be the first to see it, I promise! There are 2 short films, one that highlights all 3 award winners, and one specific to KPL.
Here's the "all three" version 

Besides accepting out Power Library Award in Atlanta last weekend, I talked to a number of vendors and librarians who shared some pretty interesting ideas. Here are a few:

• SirsiDynix is developing a new Customer Engagement Platform that would pull together all the pieces of our marketing efforts with images, text and email notifications to everyone with a library account, and replace the website program calendar with a different model. The product combines with wifi beacons, so even if someone doesn't have a library account, they could get a pop up message on their phone alerting them to an upcoming program.
• I'm also interesting in using SirsiDynix products already available to create our website, integrating everything. The Alexandria, Virginia library is one example of a library already doing this.  Although I don't care for the colors, the structure works for me. Why deal with separate catalog and website when you can integrate everything?  Here are some more examples: 

Wyoming
Minnesota
Delaware
Houston

• Sirsi is launching a Blue Cloud Mobile app along with a library app for kids- we'll watch their development. The new app allows more integration with library information.
• Overdrive is launching a feature where people can apply for and get an instant digital library card via the Overdrive Libby App. 
• One library gives out noise-cancelling headphones to people who long for a quiet library. Seems like a reasonable solution to me.

Have a wonderful Friday and weekend, everyone!

Barb

Should librarians become fact checkers for their community?

Why You Stink at Fact Checking
https://theconversation.com/why-you-stink-at-fact-checking-93997

Basically, it's human nature. So if professional fact checkers are our only hope, should librarians take on this role?

Good Friday saw good public turnout

Anytime we try something new, I like to get some statistics to see whether the change made an impact. I wondered whether the public would come to the library on Good Friday, or whether we would see the same empty buildings we do on Packer game Sundays. After so many years of the city and the library buildings being closed on Good Friday, I wondered if long time residents would assume we were closed. And I wondered if our strong faith community would attend the library on a Holy Day.
Looks like our marketing efforts spread the word well. Good Friday appears to be a day for library visits. Public attendance was strong! 2,881 circs even with the BKM off the road, compared to 3,169 average on the other four Fridays in March.
I hope the floating holiday concept is working for all of you and for those of you who wanted to observe the Holy Day, you were able to observe the holiday your way.
Barb