Index
- System Celebration award nomination deadline is June 15
- Order your free 2009 SLP school visit video now
- Member/Staff News
- Annual Wisconsin Literacy Celebration is May 7
- $300 grants available to sponsor writers and illustrators
- American Libraries article focuses on Recovery & Reinvestment Act
- MMoCA sponsors April 21 program on children’s learning
- Continuing Education Calendar
System Celebration award nomination deadline is June 15
System Celebration 2009 will be held Thursday, Sept. 24, at Windsor Golf Club near Madison, and while that date is still months away, the deadline for award nominations is June 15, 2009.
Nominations are being accepted for the annual awards listed below, so visit www.scls.info/about/systemceleb/ and click on the award name to access the online form (all nominations must be submitted online). These awards are selected by SCLS staff, and approved by the Advocacy Committee, but suggestions and formal nominations from the SCLS community are welcome.
The 2009 awards are:
- Library of the Year Award -- Recognizes a public and/or multitype library for its innovative user service(s). You may nominate your own library or any other library of any type that you think deserves the award. The library will be recognized with a certificate and a check for $200 (if one award is given) or $150 each (if both a public and multitype award are given.)
- Public Official Award -- Recognizes the outstanding contributions to a library or libraries by a mayor, village president, city administrator, supportive council member, legislator, or any other public official who does not serve as a library trustee and whom you feel should be recognized.
- Special Award -- Recognizes an individual or group that has worked to promote and/or improve library services. Individuals may be a resident, a trustee or a library friend (does not have to be a member of an official Friends group). This award is NOT for a library, librarian, or public official.
- Chester Pismo Snavely Award for a Nifty Activity -- Recognizes a library, other organization, or persons' out-of-the-ordinary nifty library activity or service.
- Partnership Award -- The SCLS Partnership Award is presented each year to a community organization, agency or business that works with the South Central Library System or its member libraries to provide new and innovative library programs and services. In some cases, a member library may also be acknowledged in conjunction with the community partner.
System Celebration is our annual thank you to the staff, trustees, and mayors/village presidents of SCLS member libraries for their support and efforts throughout the year, and the awards are an important component of that recognition. Take a moment to nominate a library, activity, or library supporter who makes a difference for you and your library.
The call for nominations and the nomination forms are only available on the SCLS web page. In addition to using the nomination forms yourself, please share the call for nominations with others in the SCLS community who may not have received this information via email or through Online Update.
Online registration will be available later this summer.
Order your free 2009 SLP school visit video now
In preparation for the 2009 Summer Library Program -- Be Creative @ Your Library -- we are again offering a school visit video that is available free to our member libraries. This year’s footage was videotaped March 17, 18, 19 and 24 at Middleton Public Library, E.D. Locke Public Library in McFarland, DeForest Area Public Library, and Verona Public Library, respectively.
To obtain single or multiple copies of the 2009 SLP School Visit Video, simply complete the form at www.scls.info/pr/slp/2009_video/. We will customize your library’s copy with your program dates, a photo of your library, and photo of your SLP staff members. We’ll add to this a voice-over that will run at the beginning and end of the video. The information requested on the form is needed to create a custom video for your library, so please answer all questions.
Cindy Schult is the new director of the Lester Public Library of Arpin. Prior to her appointment as director, she was a staff member at the library.
Kristine Millard and Trisha Priewe have accepted promotions to co-directors of the Lodi Public Library. The library has been without a director since the death of Peg Hilliker in November 2008. Kristine and Trish worked together with the library's board of trustees during the period from November until the present to guide the library until new leadership could be selected. "The board is extremely pleased that Kristine and Trish are now officially in place," said library board president Terry Manley. "We all feel it brings two people who know our community and its expectations into the key management positions for our library. Both of them are well aware of the challenges that face the library and are excited about continuing to build on its strong community foundation."
Annual Wisconsin Literacy Celebration is May 7
Wisconsin Literacy will host its 7th Annual Celebration of Literacy at the Edgewater Hotel, 666 Wisconsin Ave. Madison, on Thursday, May 7, 2009 from 5-8 p.m. This is an opportunity to celebrate award-winning adult learners, tutors and literacy advocates in Wisconsin.
Tickets are $35, which includes an hors d'oeuvres buffet and dessert -- and the opportunity to support literacy in Wisconsin. This year’s keynote speaker is Michael Feldman, host of the nationally syndicated radio show "Whad'Ya Know?"
Please RSVP by April 30, 2009. For more information, call (608) 257-1655 or visit online at www.wisconsinliteracy.org.
$300 grants available to sponsor writers and illustrators
Using grants awarded by the Wisconsin Center for the Book, communities can celebrate and explore the literature of Wisconsin through its authors and illustrators. The Wisconsin Center for the Book will award up to four grants of $300 each to qualifying organizations wishing to sponsor a Wisconsin author or illustrator at a public event. The event must be open to the public and free of charge. The grants are made possible through the cooperation of the Woodland Pattern Book Center and the generosity of donors.
Wisconsin nonprofit organizations interested in books and reading are eligible to apply, and collaboration among groups is preferred. Such groups may include, but are not limited to: libraries, public and private elementary, secondary, and post-secondary schools, community organizations, and places of worship. Libraries are encouraged to look beyond their Friends groups for partnerships.
Applications will be judged on the basis of community outreach and collaboration, thoroughness of planning, and rationale for the choice of speaker. Applications may be obtained at the Wisconsin Center for the Book website.
Applications are due July 1, 2009, and winners will be notified by July 30. Programs should be scheduled between Sept. 1, 2009, and April 30, 2010. A final report must be submitted within 10 days of the event or the honorarium will be forfeited. The definition of a Wisconsin author or illustrator is “Any author or illustrator who has lived in Wisconsin for a significant period of time, including someone who may no longer be living in the state.”
More information may be obtained by calling Sarah McGowan, WAIS 2009-10 Chair, at (920) 748-2784.
American Libraries article focuses on Recovery & Reinvestment Act
The economy is the top news story of 2009, and the role of libraries during these difficult times has been prominently focused in many news articles. Following on this theme, Emily Sheketoff of the ALA Washington Office has written an article for American Libraries about how libraries can benefit from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act.
That article will appear in the May print issue of American Libraries, but you can read it online now at www.ala.org/ala/alonline/resources/selectedarticles/arrastimulus.cfm.
MMoCA sponsors April 21 program on children’s learning
What role does language play in our ability to learn? UW-Madison psychology professors Jenny Saffran and Seth Pollak will discuss contemporary perspectives, complex human behaviors, and new insights about the emergence of young children's language and social skills, raising questions about basic scientific theories and how they apply to public policy. Their Academy Evenings presentation, “Children's Learning and Development: New Approaches to the Old Nature-Nurture Debate,” begins at 7:00 pm on April 21, at the Madison Museum of Modern Art Lecture Hall in Overture Center for the Arts, Madison.
Saffran and Pollak's discussion is a presentation of the Wisconsin Academy of Sciences, Arts and Letters, as part of its Academy Evenings series. No tickets are required. Admission is free. Doors open at 6:15 pm. Seating is first come, first served.
This Academy Evenings presentation is sponsored by the Pleasant T. Rowland Foundation, the Madison Community Foundation, the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation, the University of Wisconsin-Madison, The Evjue Foundation, M&I Bank, and a number of individual donors.
Saffran's research focuses on the kinds of learning abilities required to master the complexities of language. Three broad issues characterize her work. One line of research asks what kinds of learning emerge in infancy. A second line of research probes the biases that shape human learning abilities, and the relationship between these biases and the structure of human languages. A third issue concerns the extent to which the learning abilities underlying this process are specifically tailored for language acquisition. Saffran is also interested in infant music perception, and the relationship between music and language learning.
Pollak is a developmental psychopathologist. He is interested in understanding the mechanisms through which children's experiences increase biobehavioral development and vulnerability for behavioral disorders. The goal of his work is to use psychopathological processes to help us to understand relative contributions of "nature" and "nurture" to human development, and the role of social experience on brain development. His studies seek to understand children's adaptive and maladaptive behaviors by exploring the developmental processes linking emotion, neural plasticity, and mental health.