Over at my other blog, I have pondered whether or not I want to merge my two blogs together. Sometimes it is hard to keep up with two, but I do like having one that caters more to my profession, and then be able to speak about my more personal passions someplace else.
So, with a refresh on the design (which is still ongoing), I will move forward here and resolve to continue its existence, especially since I need to finish CPD23!
The end of the year brought a bit of an anti-climactic ending at work. We have been getting ready to migrate to a new ILS, Evergreen, but have been slowed by development and the desire to make sure our member libraries have what they need to make the process as smooth as possible. We are not there yet, but should be soon. Our network, along with others in the state, have made a lot of development commitments to this open source system, which are reviewed at the MassLNC site.
Side note - we are hiring! Here is a link to our Circulation Services Associate position.
As part of my duties in Access Services, I am now reviewing the redesign of the online catalog Evergreen has implemented, called Template Toolkit (Tpac). It is a lot more aesthetically pleasing, and I am hoping there is a (however slim) possibility it will be production-ready for our network in the very near future. Along with this is the partnership we have with several other library networks to develop a children's version of the online catalog. We have this available in our current system, and bringing it back is a strong priority for our libraries.
Add to this the continuing work with OverDrive and digital downloads. While ebooks take up most of the very extensive 15-minutes of fame - our audiobook circulations still hold pretty steady. Hold queues are increasing, prices are increasing, titles are getting scarcer with publishers tightening restrictions on what is being made available to libraries. Patrons (and sometimes staff) feel like there is never anything available in our digital catalog. Trying to keep up with holds and purchases is almost a full-time job already. I have one staff person who devotes a lot of time to it, and I supplement with selection duties for various areas in genre fiction, non-fiction and young adult. However, we are not just acquiring for one library, but over 145. We have around one million patrons in our system, so there are going to be wait times for digital books. Always.
This year I hope to continue to create presentations and writings for librarianship. I have a session coming up in May at the Digital Commonwealth Conference (as President, it's kind of a prerequisite), and I am doing some OverDrive trainings for member libraries. With the amount of gadgets I own, I have my own petting zoo! I am in the midst of writing a chapter proposal for submission, and still enjoying the reviewing duties I have with Library Journal.
I feel like I am finally hitting my groove professionally, so I expect this year to be a great one!
No comments:
Post a Comment