If you’re part of the library community in one of these states, update your WebJunction account today and request to be affiliated with your state’s WebJunction site on the “My Affiliations” tab as you edit your account.

For more information on the program and how to apply, see the USDA Rural Development fact sheet.

Applications are handled by USDA Rural Development field offices. To reach the USDA Rural Development contact for a specific state, visit www.rurdev.usda.gov/ – adding the two-letter initial of the state to the end of the URL.

The Gail Borden Public Library is the heart and hub of exciting activities in Elgin, Illinois. Its motto, “Learning is a Journey…Start It Here,” has been the inspiration behind many activities, including the Dr. Torres Library Card Challenge, a month-long program that resulted in 8,000 new library cards for local kids; the A Tapestry of Freedom project, which encouraged residents – especially foreign-born patrons – to share their stories of struggle and triumph with fellow Elgin citizens; and the GIANTS: African Dinosaurs and SPACE: Dare to Dream programs that brought to the library prehistoric visitors and objects from far flung galaxies. With all of the fantastic programs and events at the Gail Borden Public Library, community members ask just one question: “What next!”

The full cast of winners are as diverse as the nation’s cultural landscape: small and large, urban and rural. They have one thing in common: they have developed innovative ways to serve their communities.

Winners of the 2009 National Medal for Museum and Library Service are:

1. Braille Institute Library Services, Los Angeles, CA
2. Children’s Museum of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA
3. Cincinnati Museum Center at Union Terminal, Cincinnati, OH
4. Gail Borden Public Library, Elgin, IL
5. Indianapolis Museum of Art, Indianapolis, IN
6. Multnomah County Library, Portland, OR
7. Museum of Science & Industry, Tampa, FL
8. Pritzker Military Library, Chicago, IL
9. Stark County District Library, Canton, OH
10. Tennessee Aquarium, Chattanooga, TN

Nominations for the 2010 award are due on February 16. Don’t miss this opportunity to showcase your library’s award winning community service!

Are you or your WebJunction friends making the news? Please, do tell!

Submit your library’s digital story during TechSoup Global’s Digital Storytelling Challenge open now through October 16th. What a great opportunity to showcase all the great work your library is doing, win prizes and end up with a great PR piece to use in ongoing advocacy efforts!

Tell your library’s story in a 5-panel image story on Flickr or a 60 second YouTube video or GoldMail audio-visual message. You’ll be in the running to win one of the many fabulous prizes including a FlipVideo camera, Adobe software, mp3 players and more!

“But wait, I’ve never made a video before. And I have no photo skills.”

No experience is required! Whether you’re a first-time storyteller or video veteran, they’ve got resources and tools from the webinar sessions here, here, and here, to help guide you along the way.

“I don’t know if we have the time–or the budget–to do it.”

The good news is that digital storytelling doesn’t have to be expensive. They’ve listed a number of free and low cost tools you can use to create your story.

“Help! I’m trying to work on my digital story and I’m running into difficulty.”

Never fear–the expert hosts from the Digital Storytelling webinars will be available in the TechSoup forums during the Challenge, so don’t be shy about posting any questions you have.

I’m bringing story back! How do I submit it?

Visit the Challenge page for instructions on how to submit your story! While you’re there, you can see additional details about the Challenge guidelines, judging, and prizes.

How to Stay Informed and Contact :

Stay tuned on the event website, register to receive email announcements, and follow the action on Twitter #tsdigs. If you would like to get in touch directly feel free to contact the TechSoup Team: tsdigs@techsoupglobal.org. They’re eager to help!

This week, we are re-releasing a really useful one for those of you out there who have been thrust into a technology support and planning role for your library. The course: Updating and Upgrading Library Computer Software, walks you through the process of evaluating patron or staff needs with costs, time and hidden drawbacks involved in updating a given piece of software on a public or staff computer. It provides a framework for coming to the right decision for your specific situation, whether you are working with free plugins, paid-for applications, or even operating systems.

You’ll take away some valuable tools that should immediately help with your library’s technology planning and PAC software maintenance efforts, including some handy checklists of questions to ask for different software situations.

IMPORTANT NOTE: As always, if you are a member of one of our WebJunction Partners, chances are you have free or discounted access to this course through their catalog. In that case, instead of using the links above, go first to the Partner site, then to the Courses tab and will find this course listed under Technology (general) > Public Access Computing.

• ALA’s Banned Books Week site including free downloads and display ideas.
• BannedBooksWeek.org has an excellent list of what you can do.
• Read these School Library Journal articles on books about book banning and how some libraries and bookstores are celebrating this year.
• I loved this banned books week challenge from a new blogger: read an old favorite and something newly banned.
• And of course there’s a group for Banned Books Week on Facebook…become a fan!

Share about your Banned Books Week celebrations below in comments or in this discussion on WebJunction or consider posting your materials related to banned books or resources for responding to challenges to library materials in the Intellectual Freedom topic area.

About this same time, WebJunction approached ARSL with the offer to use follow-on funding from the Gates Foundation’s Rural Sustainability Project. The idea was to support ARSL’s website on WebJunction.org, and make WebJunction tools available to the ARSL board at no charge. The board accepted the offer of support as they helped the association get off the ground. Since then, ARSL has been using the webjunction.org/arsl page as their primary home page, along with ARSL BCR pages that allow memberships and conference registrations to happen as a link to that page.

I’ve worked closely with the team who managed our Rural Library Sustainability project since its inception, and served on ARSL’s board as an ex-officio member since February. In my time with ARSL’s board I’ve had a unique opportunity to observe an exciting time in the history of their organization’s development.  Every member of the ARSL board has made great strides in developing an organization that’s truly poised and responsive to the rural and small library members they serve. It has been a great pleasure to get to know the ARSL board members and to be a small part of this work.

Two years later, ARSL is no longer a new organization. They have many things well-established now and are looking to step out into new directions.  One of their areas of focus over the coming year is to look for ways to define their unique identity, and to be more responsive to their members. One way they plan to do this is to launch an all new, independent website. The vision for this site is that it be a dynamic space that captures ARSL’s personality and mission in a way that is appealing and relevant their members. Elements of this website, including the new ARSL logo, were unveiled at their annual conference this weekend.

Please visit their new website at http://www.arsl.info.

We are very excited about this development for ARSL and look forward to seeing the new site evolve. We also look forward to finding new ways to partner with ARSL in the coming year, as we each strive towards a common mission of working together to meet the needs in small and rural libraries. Co-sponsoring webinar programs is one idea, but there are so many other possibilities.

WebJunction will continue our focus on public access computing support for rural and small libraries. We’ll publish our Rural Update with news and announcements of special interest to those working in small and rural libraries. We’ll also keep you posted when we have rural-focused programs, webinars, or new content posted to the site. WebJunction will remain a great resource for people to find and connect with one another to support whatever you’re working on in your library. If you have ideas for topics, programs, or other things you might need, as always, please let us know.

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And with UAE in the group spotlight, what better time to share some exciting news about WebJunction staffer, Zola Maddison. She has accepted an offer to serve as the Coordinator of the Learning Enhancement Center at Zayed University in Abu Dhabi. While all in the WebJunction family, members, partners and staff, will miss her greatly, we’re excited for this new chapter in Zola’s career and we know that she’ll remain an active member on the site! Zola has this to share:

As many of you know, I’ve been interested in global libraries for a long time. While I can’t remember a time I didn’t have the travel bug, I think this cross-section of interests really grew from my experiences as a foreign exchange student in Indonesia during Suharto’s regime. That was where I first saw information access as a means of political power (and if you’re ever having a hard time falling asleep, you can read my article on the topic). While I was in “library school,” I concurrently completed a certificate in International Development, Policy and Management. Since then, I’ve had the opportunity to work with libraries across the US, Canada, South Africa and Guatemala.

I am incredibly excited about this opportunity, but am equally sad to leave my WebJunction family. I hope you’ll keep me connected through WebJunction (zmaddison).

Zola joined WebJunction about two years ago as a Special Projects Coordinator and quickly moved into her current role as a Partner Services Consultant. She has been working with our State Library partners since November 2007 has led efforts to showcase our partners as thought leaders in the e-learning and online community space.

Throughout her time here, Zola’s interest in working with international libraries has also been apparent as she presented at the IFLA conference in South Africa, received sponsorship for the ALA Emerging Leaders program from the International Relations Round Table, and onboarded WebJunction’s first international partner, BC Libraries.

If you’re attending ALA, be sure to stop and congratulate her, and know that we won’t let her stray far from the WebJunction fold! I’ve already got her on my list of prospective webinar presenters…I see a session on international librarianship coming soon!

♣ The Competency Index

Competency Index for the Library Field is a compilation of competency statements that address a broad spectrum of library practice and service. We aggregated and de-duped twelve leading competency sets from the field and then subjected them to a vigorous review by subject matter expert practitioners. We invite you to download the resulting publication and remix and reinvent it in whatever way best serves your library’s size, structure, and personnel development needs.

♣ Competency-course-content connections

We have integrated a fourth set of competencies from the Index with the WebJunction catalog—The Personal/Interpersonal competencies. Also referred to as soft skills, foundational or behavioral competencies, they apply to most job roles and form the underpinning of effective and stellar practice and service. Start on the Competencies tab of the WebJunction Courses page and discover connections to courses and resources aligned with specific skills and knowledge statements. You can also explore learning opportunities related to library management, core technology, and systems & IT.

♣ Competency evaluations

The results are in from the two competency evaluations WebJunction conducted in March and April. We asked respondents from across the field to evaluate themselves on a selection of skills and knowledge statements for library management and technology. Read the summaries and look for the detailed results in the PDF attached to each summary.

• Library Management Competency Evaluation Results
• Technology Competency Evaluation Results