Friday, July 07, 2006
Summer Reading exploded at CCLS this year, with a wonderful surge of interest by the youngsters, who have enrolled this year in a big way. Our programs have been very well attended, and all the libraries are featuring events nearly every week. Interest in the adult and young adult reading raffles has also grown, from the looks of the stubs in the raffle cans. Programs have featured baseball, Chinese jump rope, Tai Chi moves, and other events to focus on this year’s theme: Reading, the Sport of Champions. The program continues through July 15, with more programs and movies to be presented, as well as our famous “End of Summer Reading” parties, where the children receive their certificates for a job well done.
Our database is in the process of a huge growth spurt at this writing; over 28,000 title records for “e-books” have been loaded into the system, and we are editing them for easy understanding and access by the patrons and the staff. This will increase our database size by 20%, and provide another method for patrons to get the materials they need. The actual e-books are housed in the Texas State Library TexShare database site, which is reached through our webpage with a password provided at our libraries. Patrons can “check out” a title for reading, and can copy and paste parts they need, if they are doing a term paper, for example. The books include titles like the classics, and everything else from engineering materials to dog raising.
The library’s webpage continues to alter in content and look, with several staff members adding tweaks and features. The “Librarian’s Blog” and the “Teen Blog” are both receiving comments from readers. We are currently attempting to add the Wallisville Age Index, which was created by Assistant County Librarian Valerie Jensen as part of her grad school project, for access by the public. It is housed in the “Special Collections” part of the webpage, but we haven’t got it working yet. That takes a little assist from the IT Department.
We continue to receive help from the county to enhance our facilities each month. Our storm-damaged marquee sign at Winnie was anchored firmly back on its base by the Building Maintenance folks, who also worked with the county fathers to get a new roof on the building. The IT Department transferred a few of the unused wireless network computers from the Pine Island site to the library system, where they will get a real workout at last. And of course, the wonderful Parks Department fellows have been hard at it making our block look good in spite of thunder, lightning, and rain. The lawns are lovely and green.
The Houston Area Library System has once again awarded us with a Technical Improvement Grant, and we will be receiving a new computer in the fall as a result. Funds from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation were received for the most recent upgrade to their ongoing efforts to provide computer access to those who can’t get it elsewhere. Those machines will be purchased before December. And the Texas Loan Star fund grant provided a new computer with a Spanish operating system this month for Anahuac, to be added to the wireless network.
Our database is in the process of a huge growth spurt at this writing; over 28,000 title records for “e-books” have been loaded into the system, and we are editing them for easy understanding and access by the patrons and the staff. This will increase our database size by 20%, and provide another method for patrons to get the materials they need. The actual e-books are housed in the Texas State Library TexShare database site, which is reached through our webpage with a password provided at our libraries. Patrons can “check out” a title for reading, and can copy and paste parts they need, if they are doing a term paper, for example. The books include titles like the classics, and everything else from engineering materials to dog raising.
The library’s webpage continues to alter in content and look, with several staff members adding tweaks and features. The “Librarian’s Blog” and the “Teen Blog” are both receiving comments from readers. We are currently attempting to add the Wallisville Age Index, which was created by Assistant County Librarian Valerie Jensen as part of her grad school project, for access by the public. It is housed in the “Special Collections” part of the webpage, but we haven’t got it working yet. That takes a little assist from the IT Department.
We continue to receive help from the county to enhance our facilities each month. Our storm-damaged marquee sign at Winnie was anchored firmly back on its base by the Building Maintenance folks, who also worked with the county fathers to get a new roof on the building. The IT Department transferred a few of the unused wireless network computers from the Pine Island site to the library system, where they will get a real workout at last. And of course, the wonderful Parks Department fellows have been hard at it making our block look good in spite of thunder, lightning, and rain. The lawns are lovely and green.
The Houston Area Library System has once again awarded us with a Technical Improvement Grant, and we will be receiving a new computer in the fall as a result. Funds from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation were received for the most recent upgrade to their ongoing efforts to provide computer access to those who can’t get it elsewhere. Those machines will be purchased before December. And the Texas Loan Star fund grant provided a new computer with a Spanish operating system this month for Anahuac, to be added to the wireless network.
# posted by Valerie @ Friday, July 07, 2006 
