May 2006 Good Stuff.Indd

THE OFFICIAL MAGAZINE OF THE NORTH DAKOTA LIBRARY ASSOCIATION June 2006 NDLA Website - http://www.ndla.info Volume 36 • Issue 2 NDLA President Jeanne Narum Jeanne in front of Kumamoto Visits Japan Prefectural Library Kumamoto University Library Nishibash-sensei, Jeanne and Katie Miyamoto Outside drop box at at Kumamoto University Library Kumamoto City Library Editorial Policy The Good Stuff welcomes your comments and suggestions. We reserve the right to edit letters/ articles for publication. Please include your name and address when writing. Letters should be sent to Marlene Anderson, P.O. Box 5587, Bismarck, ND 58506-5587, The Good Stuff Editorial Committee, or e-mail: Marlene.Anderson@bsc. nodak.edu Submission Guidelines & Deadlines Consider submitting news and articles via e-mail! Send your articles /news to any of the following e-mail addresses: [email protected] Published quarterly by the [email protected] North Dakota Library Association [email protected] [email protected] Editorial Committee Marlene Anderson, Chair Karen Anderson Joan Erickson Erin Smith Deadlines for Articles/News Submission Production Artist Issue Deadline Clearwater Communications March . .January 13, 2006 Robin Pursley June. .March 17, 2006 August (Pre-Conference) . June 23, 2006 Subscription Rate December . October 30, 2006 $25/year Advertising Rates (per issue) $100 – full-page ad Minutes and Reports are linked to $50 – half-page ad www.ndla.info/exbdmin.htm $25 – quarter-page ad For information contact: Marlene Anderson, Chair The Good Stuff Editorial Committee The Good Stuff - Page 2 - June 2006 President’s Message By Jeanne Narum, NDLA President Soaring subscription prices and an unfavorable exchange rate have led to a reduction in the Kunichiwa! Hello and number of available journal titles in Japan’s greetings from Japan where my universities. This parallels the problem U.S. daughter has taught English libraries once faced in journal purchasing. I conversation for five years learned there is a movement in Japan toward in a parochial junior high consortium building with the intent of providing and senior high school. While visiting her in online journal access to solve this problem. Kumamoto, Kyushu in March, I explored different library settings, comparing and contrasting them Japan is a democratic nation composed of 46 to ours in the United States. prefectures and four regions where about 121 million people live. The literacy rate is extremely During a fifteen-course Japanese dinner hosted high due in part to compulsory schooling where by the president of the university for our family, attendance is nearly 100 percent. After school I learned that the recently retired president’s activities and compulsory Saturday morning wife had been a librarian! She and I shared classes – Kagai – contribute to little time for information access stories through our translator. pleasure reading. Public libraries are challenged When she worked in a university library she said to develop reading programs for their young the most difficult task was teaching the concept citizens. Bookmobile service is offered in of credibility in Internet website research. It different parts of Japan. The buses carry about took students a long time to determine which 1,500 books to children who live in small information on which website was valuable for communities. The bus makes several stops a day research purposes. I visited Kumamoto University at elementary schools and kindergartens. During Library and spoke with a librarian who is my those bus stops, the librarian tells stories or puts daughter’s friend. Yes, they do have automated on puppet shows to entice children to read. circulation systems and interlibrary loan of journal articles or research books, but there Public libraries are closed every Monday of were only two computers in the library and no the month, plus the last day of the month for electronic databases available. This was difficult “maintenance.” These are clean up days for the for me to imagine. Japanese citizens have the building. The libraries have automated circulation most advanced cell phones I have ever seen. systems, children’s books, audiobooks, and Children as young as three use their cell phones interlibrary loan, but no computers or electronic to call home and their friends. They can “text databases for information access. (A Japanese message” on their cell phones faster than I can public library will be the first in the world to use type on a keyboard! (I once saw a junior high palm vein biometric authentication instead of boy bicycling to school, holding an umbrella in library cards beginning in October 2006). one hand and text messaging with the other!) All Japanese cell phones are cameras now -- used We visited the Kumamoto City Library and the for taking digital images or video -- so not having Kumamoto Prefectural Library. (Prefects in electronic databases in the university library really Japan are similar to our county divisions). How amazed me. My Japanese son-in-law said he do students conduct research for papers? The never used electronic magazine databases until high school library I visited in Kumamoto had he studied at an American university. two computers in addition to lots of books and The Good Stuff - Page 3 - June 2006 President’s Message magazines. Talking through a translator, I learned management, but stark differences in library that students are taught Office skills (Word and technology between the two countries. Excel) in a computer lab, which is in a separate classroom, but when homework is due, the On another note... assignment is handwritten. When I asked other teachers about additional skills being taught in Conference Chair Beth Postema and the Fargo the computer lab, no one seemed to know what local arrangements committee are planning a was taught. fabulous 100th anniversary conference. Using the theme, “Celebrating the Past, Embracing the I found out that in 1990, the Japan School Library Future,” ALA President Michael Gorman will be Association estimated that 99.4% of elementary the banquet speaker and Leif Enger the Thursday schools, 98.8% of junior high schools, and 1% luncheon speaker. Please contact Beth if you of senior high schools have school libraries. The have additional program proposals. average library book/pupil ratio at an elementary school is 15.3 volumes, at the junior high level Archivist Christine Kujawa will be developing 13.4 volumes, and at the senior high level 18.2 a mural for the conference this year showing volumes per pupil. The appointment of a full-time pictures of North Dakota libraries along with the teacher librarian with a teaching degree is almost people who work in them. Historical pictures as nonexistent. In most schools, the responsibilities well as current ones are being solicited. Please of library management are shared among subject contact Christine at the Bismarck Public Library and/or classroom teachers. I discovered many to have your pictures added to this exciting and similarities in reading programs and library celebratory project. Thanks to Sean Thorenson, Assistant Professor of Commercial Art, and the students in his Techniques of Design class at Bismarck State College, NDLA has a centennial logo! In December, Cathy Langemo and Marlene librarians and to promoting libraries and library Anderson met with Sean about the idea of a class services in the state. You need to think beyond project to design a logo for NDLA’s centennial. the obvious (books) because librarians and The deal was struck and the 2006 Spring Semester libraries provide many information services that Techniques of Design class worked on the project don’t involve books. For example, librarians using these guidelines: provide reference and research assistance; teach people how to use information sources; The North Dakota Library Association is and provide programming for children, youth looking for a logo that will celebrate their 100 years as an association dedicated to helping Continued on page 27 The Good Stuff - Page 4 - June 2006 Calendar Girls (and Boys) Wanted Attention: State and Federal Government Document Under the Librariansskilled direction You still have an opportunity to reserve a place in posterity! of Kathy Thomas of NDSU Libraries, NDLA’s GODORT (Government Documents Roundtable) will produce a calendar featuring YOUR photo. Alas! To date, Kathy has only received two photos and she needs enough for each of the twelve months of the year. Please arrange for a digital photo of individual or groups of document librarians from your institution and send them to Kathy ASAP. Include state or federal documents in the photo. Let your imagination go! At the big 100th to-do in Fargo this fall, librarians from all walks can take home (at no cost!) a terrific souvenir, courtesy of GODORT. Just think … your photo could be hanging on somebody’s library wall until the NDLA Bicentennial! Also, be sure to identify who’s who in your photo and where they’re from and to include citations for the documents featured.u. Look lovely! [email protected] Contact Kathy at Grant Monies Available NORTH DAKOTA LIBRARY ASSOCIATION GRANT APPLICATION FORM This Application is for: __Professional Development Gran By Karen Chobot, Chair __Ron Rudser Memorial Grant t " Name: ________________________________ (Last) ____________________________ Professional Development Grants Committee (First) " (Middle) Address:_________________ ______________ Telephone:__ ____________ ________________________________

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