heyteachergivethosebooksaloan - Tumblr blog

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Reblog if you think public libraries are important and should be maintained.

[heyteachergivethosebooksaloan]

Use your library or suffer the consequences

[heyteachergivethosebooksaloan]

EMPTYING THE BOOK DROP DURING SUMMER READING

[heyteachergivethosebooksaloan]

Shabbat Sabotage by Emma Carlson Berne is a great middle grade novel that just came out recently! It's about a bunch of girls at a Jewish summer camp who have to solve a mystery when the silver kiddush cup and two candlesticks that they need in order to lead Shabbat go missing.

I haven't had a chance to read it through yet and I am not Jewish myself but what I have read looks really cute and it is definitely a positive and fun realistic fiction read with a Jewish focus.

I know at different points people have mentioned the struggle of finding Jewish books that aren’t about the Holocaust. If you ever want good books for older kids, pjourway.org has a bunch of good ones

[heyteachergivethosebooksaloan]

WHEN YOU FIRST GET WEEDING RESPONSIBILITIES

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^A million times this

[heyteachergivethosebooksaloan]

The point of reading isn't just consume tropes 🙄 it's to log every book you read at your local librarys summer reading program making you eligible for fun prizes and an end of the summer pizza party

[heyteachergivethosebooksaloan]

things librarians judge you for:

saying the book came to you like that when clearly your dog chewed on it

trying to reshelve books on your own

yelling at us to get our attention

talking on your phone when we’re trying to assist you

yelling at non-management staff for policies they have no power over

asking for more time on the computer when the session has already logged you off, you needed to ask for that time 5 minutes ago

asking us to look something up for you by the call number. the call number tells you where it is. please just give me the title.

getting upset with us for anything COVID related

things librarians do NOT judge you for (unless they’re bad at librarianing):

reading erotica

using the copier incorrectly

not speaking english as a first language

being an adult and not reading grown up books

owing fines

liking romance novels

finding out your child’s card is blocked because they’ve been billed for books they’ve secretly been hiding behind their dresser

having books overdue

you liking graphic novels and comics

your CHILD liking graphic novels and comics. seriously. we just want them to read.

taking books off of a display

asking us to check and make sure we don’t have a book you returned (with COVID and quarantining books, more things are getting missed, so asking a librarian to do a shelf check is okay! but be nice. we are So Tired and Busy. if you say something like “if you’re busy feel free to check when you have time and get back to me” we will love you. we will probably be like “you’ve been nice so i’ll go right now”)

things librarians judge, but don’t judge YOU for:

James Patterson. Look. we all know everyone likes him. That’s great, we love that people read because of him! But we do judge James Patterson as an entity. He’s got so many goddamn books. they take up so much goddamn space. james. jimmy. jimsicle. just. stop putting your name on things, please, we are begging you. liking james patterson is Valid. BEING james patterson is not valid.

[heyteachergivethosebooksaloan]

How do the kids do online research

In my experience with my students (8-12 year olds), if given a question like, say, “list five famous Africans and what they are famous for”, they will type verbatim into google “list five famous Africans and what they are famous for”, click on the first youtube video, and if that doesn’t give them the exact answer they need, immediately give up.

[heyteachergivethosebooksaloan]

Me: I need a library card, but I just moved so I don’t have an ID with my address or any mail with it.

Librarian: -slides me a blank library postcard- Write your address on this like it would be mailed to you.

Me: Sure?

Librarian: -takes it back- Great! Now we have mail with your address on it!

Me: …does it really work that way?

Librarian: the rules don’t say it DOESN’T work that way. Here’s your new library card!

[heyteachergivethosebooksaloan]

My library would LOVE to be open nights & weekends. We want people to use the library for socialization and learning! We’re not about that “shhhh” life!

Our funding is so slashed though, especially now with COVID, that we can barely keep the library staffed for our current hours (and we’re the best funded in the system atm from my understanding).

We actually can’t even afford to be open at our full service hours (which still doesn’t include the full evening and weekend hours) even though the state wants us to be and is threatening to slash our funding even more if we aren’t.

One of the librarians on staff created an entire board game collection & program for people to just be able to hang out and socialize for free. But, he had to do it with donations, out of pocket purchases, and general finagling because the funding isn’t there. Most of us are doing unpaid work on our free time to make the hours we can afford to be open serve the population as best as possible (i.e. I just filled out so many grant requests on my day off, a co-worker is running a teen services discord from her couch with her toddler on her day off, and the library director isn’t ever not helping people find vaccination sites/ answering random middle of the night questions on our facebook).

In New York, where I’m at there was actually a huge fight just a short while ago for libraries to keep our slashed funding at the level it is now, because the governor suggested cutting library funding again which would have basically made it impossible for public libraries to function. Every librarian I know just wants to better serve the community, so please if you can, follow some of us on social media, follow the American Library Association (or your country’s professional librarian organization) because that’s how you hear about funding cuts and get the information to contact representatives and say “Um, actually, how about we give more money to libraries? I like places where I can exist without paying a bunch of money.” 

They’re not going to start funding libraries better until they realize that not doing so will effect their reelections. Every level of government has a say in public library funding, so even reaching out to your city/ town/ county/ province reps can make a huge difference.

[heyteachergivethosebooksaloan]

i do unironically love saying The Before Times when talking about covid. if we’re gonna be in a deadly pandemic we might as well talk like we’re in bad YA. let’s allow ourselves that

[heyteachergivethosebooksaloan]

This is so important. One of my last days working at the public library I helped to update (they hadn’t had a professional librarian in the last 60+ years), I had a patron arrive who hadn’t browsed the children’s section in over a year (since before we used the COVID shutdown to tackle some much needed weeding, reorganizing, cleaning & ordering for the entire area). She was aghast and got very angry with me over the fact that our children’s nonfiction section had gone from three shelf banks to one, blaming me for “destroying books” when I explained that they were either added to the booksale or sent to our recycling program partner. My response to her was a simple one, given as kindly as possible, explaining the change. We only got rid of books that fell into one of the following categories:

1.) Books that had not been taken out in 5 years 2.) Books that were out of date, such as the book on the people and culture of West Germany, the book about space that was published before man landed on the moon, or the book on the culture of Inuit peoples that used the e-slur as its title. 3.) Books in such poor shape they were more tape than paper

I wasn’t burning books for the joy and thrill it gave me. I wasn’t destroying knowledge or history. I was updating the section for today’s readers. Readers who prefer a collection of books that help them research and learn through image heavy books with up to date information. I was ensuring that the collection was balanced, sensitive, and factual.

I think she understood a bit in the end, but unfortunately many people just don’t understand that a book is only as good as its usefulness to a reader. Otherwise it’s just paper collecting dust on a shelf.

Mmmm this is some goOD SHIT. I got like 8 bursts of serotonin from this. 👌👌👌👌👌👌

[heyteachergivethosebooksaloan]

I had the same issue. The only reason we have a good chunk of Irish writers & books on Ireland in our library is because the director is second generation Irish American and buys at least a couple books about Ireland and Irish culture in a year.

I finished putting together the Irish-American heritage month display and Jesus CHRIST there are so few books about Ireland in our collection?? Once more, I must say:

[heyteachergivethosebooksaloan]

alignment chart: bookmark edition. tag yourself i’m scrap paper