Our keynote speaker Margo Gustina will present on the topic "Partnership in the Archipelago." A 2018 Library Journal Mover & Shaker, Margo is the Deputy Director for the Southern Tier Library System, a cooperative which serves predominantly rural communities in New York State. She is an outspoken believer in the strength libraries have when partnering with the community around them.

 

Registration packages are on their way to all Marigold member libraries. Registration is open to library staff AND board members and must be done online at www.showpass.com/mlw2019. Each library will receive a promo code to allow up to two free registrations. All other staff and board member registrations are $50 until April 5, and $75 after that until May 8. Please do not hesitate to contact your Library Services Consultant with questions or if you require assistance with registering. Visit www.marigold.ab.ca/workshop for more information on the workshop sessions!

 

If you require a hotel room to be booked for you, or would like to pre-order literary merchandise from Litographs or Storiarts (pricing is in your package and on the Showpass site), you must register during the Early Bird registration, which ends on April 5. General registration ends on May 8.

The Linden Municipal Library’s Indigenous Peoples of Canada event on November 24, 2018 was a success! The event began with a presentation by our guest speaker, a passionate Metis Woman named Lynn Fabrick. In an informative and interactive manner, Lynn taught our participants what it was like living as a Plains Indigenous person in the past and present and what it means to be Metis. The kids were attentive and entranced as they learned about the role of spruce and buffalo hides in Metis culture, as well as year-round sustainability methods. Lynn also brought some sashes and a diorama of a tipi to show the kids, and explained their purpose and meaning in her culture. To conclude her presentation, Lynn provided a traditional meal of homemade bannock for the kids! They gobbled up every last piece!

 

After Lynn’s presentation, the kids took part in a latch hook craft class, where they learned how to weave rugs using the latch hook method. While the kids were busy doing their craft, the event administrator spoke about what hard work it was to live without technology in the past. The kids were provided with their own latch hook kit, each with a different design. They didn’t complete the project, but were happy to take it home to finish later. The event concluded with story time. Lynn graciously donated 6 books written and illustrated by Indigenous Peoples of Canada! Two of these books were read and discussed.

 

Both Indigenous and non-Indigenous kids participated in this event. We received very good feedback from the participants and their parents, as well as requests to run the program again! The kids all said they had a lot of fun and they learned something new about Indigenous Peoples’ cultures. As a library, we are very thankful to have had the opportunity to run such a great program to teach the kids in our community about the rich and diverse Indigenous cultures in Canada.

~Submitted by Karen Drok

former Community Outreach & Program Librarian

Cochrane Public Library

 

 

Information overload is constant these days and trying to separate the wheat from the chaff is an ongoing challenge. The term “fake news” is heard frequently and Airdrie Public Library wanted to educate people on this topic, but not overwhelm them with the surfeit of information available from media organizations and educational institutions. Critical thinking skills are needed for information literacy, which is the ability to not only recognize when information is needed but have the ability to locate, evaluate, and effectively use it.

We created a button on our website with this graphic, which takes users to a single webpage, divided under headings.

 

What is Fake News? has a simple dictionary definition (according to the Collins English Dictionary, fake news is false, often sensational information, disseminated under the guise of news reporting. It is spread with the deliberate attempt to mislead.)

 

What makes a news story fake? lists some ways to identify misleading information, such as seeing that the story is an appeal to your emotions, being unable to verify the information from other sources, seeing that the authors do not have reputable credentials, and seeing that websites that look like they are from known sources are slightly altered, such as www.abcnews.com.co.

 

How to spot fake news shows the Fake News poster from the International Federation of Library Associations and Institutions:  https://www.ifla.org/publications/node/11174

 

Can YOU spot fake news?  has a link to a great fake news-spotting game – Factitious 2019, which has articles at six levels of difficulty geared to middle school students and higher to test themselves against. Give it a try!  http://factitious.augamestudio.com/#/

 

Some Fact Checking Resources lists some sites like www.factcheck.org and www.snopes.com where people can verify news stories. 

 

Other Online Fakes discusses online hoaxes and spoofs plus spam and phishing emails.

 

There is an overwhelming amount of information discussing fake news from many sources online, and each time we found a new link or source it was tempting to try to incorporate it into our webpage, but we want people to read the information, not get dizzy and lost following hyperlinks down a rabbit hole. So we opted for “short and sweet” instead, and hope we can provide a bit of education along the way.

 

~Submitted by Janet Galbraith

Customer Services Coordinator

Airdrie Public Library

 

Registration for the 2019 Alberta Library Conference is now open! The Alberta Library Conference is one of the premier library events of the year, not just for Albertans but across Canada. Join us from April 25-28 at the Fairmont Jasper Park Lodge!

 

 

Collection HQ is a tool that all Marigold libraries have access to, and it can help you with all of these things. If you haven't used Collection HQ yet, we would recommend starting in the Manage section. This section has report options to tell you popular authors, collection use, and grubby and dead items. This month we are featuring the Grubby Items Removal report in the Adult Fiction category, using Hanna Municipal Library as an example. This report is helpful to get a list of items that have circulated quite a bit and are likely not in good condition anymore, requiring weeding and possible re-purchase.

 

1. Login to the site. (If you aren't sure what your login is, please contact your Consultant.)

2. Select Manage - Fiction.

 

 

3. Select Collection Removal - Grubby Items Removal and change the settings. (You'll want the most current dataset name and your own library name.)

 

 

4. Your result will look something like this - note that it is separated by sub-collections, each on individual pages. Here you can see how often an item has circulated, and gives you the option (once you’ve looked at the item) to extend its life by a certain number of circs (increments of 10) before it shows up on the report again.

5. At this point you can move the columns around, or even remove some of them and add others. Do this by clicking on the tiny little gray area to the left of your screen near the printer icon. This will open a sidebar that looks like this. Simply drag and drop to and from the sidebar to remove/add columns. (For instance, you may not care about whether it’s the last copy, since if the condition isn’t good it should be weeded, but you might want to see when it last circulated to see if you want to purchase another copy.) Once you are satisfied with your layout, you can save it using the drop down that says Layout Options.

 

 

6. You can then Export the list to PDF or Excel or Print the list. The PDF and Print options will ask you if you want the Expanded or Collapsed version - Collapsed will combine the sub-collections so that you don't waste paper. If you export to Excel, you can sort the results by last use date and only print the ones that fall into your criteria.

All pages in Collection HQ have a question mark on them which will bring you to a help page. There are also videos available to watch to get more tips and hints! These videos are available in the top right corner under Academy.