WLA Fall Conference Registration is Open!

Registration for WLA's fall conference in lovely, liveable, walkable La Crosse is now open!! The early bird member rate available until the 9/28 is a steal at $140 for 3 days of learning, networking, screaming fun events and a chance to rub elbows with all your favorite peers from throughout the state!

Two amazing and affordable Tuesday afternoon pre-conferences start the learning:
Advocacy/Intellectual Freedom Bootcamp with ALA OIF staffers and Reader's Advisory (RA) Guru Becky Spratford bringing RA knowledge for all.

That evening I invite all attendees and vendors to a lovely reception featuring the funky music of Under Paris Skies (they play acoustic music inspired by sidewalk cafes, French cabarets, Gypsy camps, Argentine dance halls and Euro street music) at the free President's Welcome Reception at the Radisson from 7-9 pm cosponsored by Chippewa Valley Technical College Library and Information Services Program.

We kick off Wednesday with our keynote, Dr. Sybil Madison-Boyd and end on Friday with a rousing call to action Friday at a sunrise opening speech by Chloris Lowe and closing speech by Gretchen Caserotti.

In between are speakers, sessions, book creators, exhibits and fun events like the Awards Reception; Dark La Crosse Radio Show Foundation Fundraiser; Ghost Tour Pub Crawl; meet-ups; reunions; tours and food, fun and friends.

Come join me as we explore learning, leadership, inspiration and the fabulous world of librarianship in Wisconsin!

Maker Projects for Every Budget? YES, PLEASE!

Looking for some inspiration on maker projects and supplies that fit into your library's budget?  Library Journal recently shared a download for their article Cheap Thrills (originally published in the November 2017 issue of School Library Journal, with oodles of fun ideas!)

Just can't get enough? 
Do you have a fever and the only prescription is more maker spaces?  

Then you'll definitely want to feast your peepers on this!

Make It @ Your Library is a rad website where you can search for maker ideas by price per person, age...even time needed to complete each project!

Wisconsin Library Association Conference Cool Stuff!

Sorry for the absence of blog posts, I've been out of the office more than in for the past few weeks, taking part in some terrific opportunities (the Youth Services Institute, Prepare Training to learn how to defuse challenging situations, and dropping my youngest kid off at college, to name a few).

Now I'm back, and thinking about another chance to get away from the regular day-to-day work and explore some new things and hang around with some inspiring folks!  The Wisconsin Library Association Conference comes early this year, and there are several things I think you should know about this year's conference.  This is only a partial list of the things I am excited for at this conference:

• Tuesday, October 17:  Pre-conference:  Representation, Authenticity, and Being Real:  Diversity in Youth Services with Anna Haase Krueger and Tami Lee will take a deep dive into collection development and library programming, with ideas and hands-on book examination.
• Wednesday, October 18:  Andrea Davis Pinkney, author, publisher, and extraordinary speaker, will be the YSS Luncheon speaker.  Get ready to be inspired!
• Thursday, October 19:  Linda Liukas will give the keynote address.  Linda is a programmer, storyteller, and illustrator from Helsinki, Finland.  Check out her TED talk!
• Friday, October 20:  My very own cousin, Ehryn Barthelme, will be teaming up with a public librarian from Rochester, MN to discuss the reality of what teens and young adults are thinking about, dealing with and experiencing related to sexual health, sexuality, and gender expression.
• Througout the conference, you will be able to see librarians from the IFLS region presenting, including Jerissa Koenig, Rebekah Palmer, Martha Kaempffer, Jennifer Cook, Susan DeBolt, Cole Zrostlik, Katherine Elchert, and yours truly, plus you'll have a chance to see John Thompson and other contributors to the PLSR process talk about the system re-design process. 

I hope you will consider joining us for an amazing time.  Please let me know if you need some help advocating for yourself for a chance to attend!

Learning from Others

Dana and Lindsey who blog at Jbrary consistently share quality songs, ideas and resources for librarians serving youth. Their July 13, 2016 post focuses on a list of the non-librarian bloggers that inspire them with ideas, practices, booklists, and hands-on activities. See it for yourself HERE.

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Send your suggestions for blogs that inspire your programs and services to Wisconsin youth and your community to Sarah at scournoyer (at) mwfls (dot) org for a future Youth Services Shout-out post.

Ideas and Inspiration

The BookNLibrary Blogs list on the right contains lots of resources for ideas and inspiration. Another quick resource available online is the web resources page at LibrarySparks. From a chock-full calendar of ideas to bibliographies and a webliography, it is a fast way to gather ideas for displays, storytimes, or programs.

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