Our Library is a Five Star Library!

Library Journal announced the America’s Star Libraries of 2010 and Ida Long Goodman Memorial Library is sitting at the top of its category. Library Journal rates 7,407libraries across the country. Two hundred fifty eight libraries received a three, four or five stars rating; seventeen Kansas libraries earned one of those ratings. Four Kansas libraries earned a five star rating. Ida Long Goodman Memorial Library is proud to announce it was rated first in the $100,000to $199,000 budget category not only in Kansas but nationally as well. This is the third time in the last two years! Congratulations to the other five star Kansas libraries: Buhler Public Library, Hays Public Library, and Seneca Free Library.

The criteria on which Library Journal bases the award is per capita, on four service categories: library visits, circulation (how many items are checked out in a year), attendance at library programs and use of public internet computers.

Libraries supply an important service to communities. The five star rating, based on the above categories, shows that our community and surrounding area are taking advantage of those services. Libraries have always offered materials and internet to the public free of charge. The Ida Long Goodman Memorial Library Board has looked for ways that the library can become a gathering place for our community.

Our library is served by a dedicated, friendly staff and provides our services to the public in a comfortable setting. Try a cappuccino from the Internet Café while browsing the newspaper or surfing the web from your lap top. Bring a group of friends and challenge each other to a game or two on the Wii or a variety of board games (look for a Scrabble tournament to be organized the first of the year!) Book Clubs are offered throughout the winter–let us know if you’d like to be a part of one any time! The library loans not only books, magazines and newspapers but also dvds and audiobooks. The community room currently provides a meeting place for regional Boy Scout leaders, hosts a Weight Watchers group, and serves as a room for local clubs and groups to meet. The library indexes births, deaths, and marriages so people all over the U.S. can use our genealogy room to search for information on their families. Wireless internet access, computers with internet access and a web-based circulation system allows patrons access to over 30,000 items from the comfort of your own home.

What makes our library stand out above the rest? Director, Christie Snyder, believes it’s the partnerships that have been developed with other service-oriented groups in the area. With a vision before her time, Mrs. Goodman built the library with a partnership between the school district and city in mind, offering an opportunity to the students and residents of St. John that few communities have that are our size. Local businesses and organizations support library programming without reservation. The fall concert which brought Celtic guitarist, Jerry Barlow to the library is just such and example. Our children’s librarian, Jill Rockenbach, partnered with Parent’s As Teacher instructor Cheryl Foster and Stafford County Home Extentsion Officer, Amy Collins ,to bring a program on nutrition for the Kansas Reads to Preschoolers program just last week. After school programming is being offered through a partnership with the St. John Recreation Commission (Contact the commission for more information about after-school movies and ZumbAtomics).

So, does it take a village to raise a library? Yes, we believe it does – a five star library anyway. Come check us out today!

It Has Been Awhile

I haven't updated my blog since we went to North to visit my son and family (which includes spending time with the cutest grandson EVER). After a wonderful couple of weeks exploring their world, it was back to work and the fast pace of life St. John, America. Yes, our sleepy little corner of the world has a lot going on.

Students have been in school for a month all ready. The buzz of almost 300 children and their grandparents reading at our Grandparent's Day celebration earlier in September has come and gone. Thank you to our Friends group for providing and serving cookies and lemonade for our guests.

We are excited to announce the beginnings of a knitting club at our library this fall. Our first group will meet Sunday at 2 pm beginning October 3. A second group will meet Tuesdays at 3:30 pm beginning October 5. Several patrons have been generous and donated needles and yarn to learn with so if you have always wanted to learn to knit or need to jump start your skills, join us!

Monday, October 4th Celtic guitarist, Jerry Barlow will share his talents with us in a concert at 7:00 pm in the basement of the library.

Thursday, October 28th Fall Community Arts Program 7:30 pm
Tumbleweed Tales of Amazing Kansans: Entrepreneurs of Rural Kansas by
Ron Wilson

Coming soon: The St. John/Hudson PTO donated a set of six scrabble boards (THANK YOU!)so a Scrabble Tournament is in the works. Details available soon.

Old Spice Guy and Libraries

Don't you just love the Old Spice Guy? Apparently there was an Old Spice Channel where the actor posted what the "people" asked him to post as his commercial character. This is a YouTube video about using your library.



And here is a clever take-off on those fun commercials promoting a Harold B. Lee Library that was posted on YouTube. Don't you just love it?

New and Improved

The library is in the midst of a variety of changes and we are looking at them as "all good". Over the last three months we have hired two new clerks, Mark and Brandon. They both are going to be great assests to our staff. Be sure to stop in and we'll introduce you.

Mark has been giving a new look to our web pages. We hope to keep information current with his help. You can find news about upcoming events, new books added to our collection, information about the staff, library contact information, a page of helpful and interesting web sites and what services we offer. Check us out at www.usd350.com. Click on the Library tab to browse for all this and more.

This past week we updated the Alexandria catalog. There are lots of user-friendly features. Check it out at http://65.166.185.106/#_ , find it on the USD350 Library webpage or if you'd like a more indepth lesson, come on in. We'll give you a tour!

Stay cool -- come in and check out our hot new books!

Hip, Cool, and GAGA

I can so see our staff doing this in the fall to promote the library...what do you think gang?

23 Things Kansas

I thought we had until midnight May 28 to finish up 23 Things Kansas. I had 3 lessons to go and a video to upload when all the lessons disappeared probably around shortly after 9. What gives? So this video was supposed to go into my blog about Week 13 but I wasn't able to go back and see what the actual assignment was. I did get week 14 done but Week 15 & 16 was lost. I wish things at the library and in my personal life hadn't got so crazy. I would have liked the 30 hours and would probably have just finished on my own if I didn't get them done. I learned a lot and am glad I saved most of the sites in Delicious I thought would be useful or I wanted more time to explore since none of the lessons are available now.

Create your own video slideshow at animoto.com.

Library Thing, Etc

I have explored on Shelfari, Goodreads, WhichBook, What Should I Read Next -- all wonderful tools for not only for my personal reading but for patron reader's advisory. I am spending way too much time playing on these...I only have three more lessons that I might be able to finish before midnight. Anyone else out there hoping to slip in under the wire? I liked Shelfari and What Should I Read Next--keeping a list of what I've read and liked. The only complaint is that it eats up so much time. I even managed to add a Shelfari widget to my blog on Blogger!