At our Sept. 23, 2024 Rotary Meeting our speakers, Sarah Rabel and Katryna Barber, were from La Conner Swinomish Regional Library.
Katryna Barber has been the children’s librarian specialist for 6 years, 2 years at the new current library, and 4 years at the prior La Conner library. Sarah instigated the $1,500 Grant for the summer reading program that Rotary gave. Katryna is happy that our group decided to give them a generous grant to fund the summer reading program that Katryna is in charge of. Katryna also leads story time every Friday, and Craft Times. The summer reading program is a big deal for children and librarians.
The library used the grant money to buy books that were offered to any child who signed up for summer reading, and as a prime-the-pump. The parents were over the moon because their kid went home with not only books that they checked out from the library but also a book that they could keep! They had 98 kids sign up for summer reading this year, which is a lot, as last year they had somewhere in the forties. How did the library double their summer reading participation? It was the ability to purchase books the children could keep. The tracker, designed by Katryna, also helped. You could sign up at any time.
Summer reading is to encourage them to read. To do that, they gave them the book and then also gave them an 11”x17” paper map “tracker”. Every time they read, they determined what they would read and how much time they would spend every day to read. There are 78 days in the summertime, and they could color in a book every time they read. By the end of the summer, they got filled-in trackers. An example shown was by a 1st grader who filled it all in and she put titles in there. She got really into it. This example was the best one they got. The children got a certificate with their name on it showing completed summer reading, and a book bag with the name of the library and library logo on the side; the money from Rotary helped pay for the bags as well.
On the back of the tracker were all the events on calendars for the whole summer that the kids could come in and partake of. The best event was the reptile man where 75 people showed up. “So the alligator could lose bladder control on a bunch of the kids on the carpet.” :-)
They bought over a hundred books for the kids to take home. They even had people who were up for the summer who signed up for temporary library cards to join summer reading, and they all got a book.
Katryna retired Sept. 27. Next year there will be a new team as children's librarian. Char Langendorfer and Jinda Cowan will be working on that as a team, and the theme next summer is the world of color.
Sarah spoke to us at an earlier meeting (4/29/2024). She is the foundation director of the La Connor Swinomish Library and wanted to again express sincere gratitude for the grant that funded the summer routine, and for our group’s ongoing generous support and relationship with the La Conner Swinomish Library.
Tiny Trees is the library’s annual fundraising event. This year it is November 23rd at Maple Hall. La Conner Rotary is a generous sponsor, and with that, there are 4 seats available for Rotarians. Because Rotary is a top-tier sponsor, there's an opportunity at that level of sponsorship to have material like brochures or other information at the event. The event will include a table for top-tier sponsors, and there will be a space for Rotary to have some printed material.
They are focusing on technology at the library this year. When the regional library moved to the La Conner Swinomish library, it was the incredible generosity of the community that got the building built.
They moved over with the laptops, the computers, and the server. Now they are ready to invest in the digital side of the library. They would like to get patron laptops so that they can be used in the meeting room. They have patrons who would like basic email skills. In the digital age, senior citizens are interested in learning how to filter out spam, etc. Patron laptops will help with classes, and help with high school students or adult patrons just using the library for doing research. They would like to expand their online research database options and invest in online learning.
LinkedIn has linkedinlearning.com and there are a lot of opportunities for courses that are that are free when you have access. The digital world in no way replaces the books. Libraries are about books, but digital technology can supplement and add to the richness of learning and to equitable access to knowledge.
Tiny Trees has historically been a fairly small, wonderful event. It's been at the library, and it has been just the silent auction of the trees themselves. Generally, the silent auction brings in about $8,000. They are hoping for a much more robust response because there will be a live auction component. There'll be a raise-the-paddle and, thanks to sponsorships like ours, the costs of the event are covered. Anything that comes in with the silent auction, with the live auction, and with the raise-the-paddle at the event will be going directly to supporting the library's technology.
There is a consortium of libraries. Anacortes and Mt Vernon are not connected yet due to different card catalogs. Mt Vernon is switching soon. Burlington, Sedro-Woolley, and Upper Skagit/Concrete exchange books every Wednesday. For eBooks, La Conner Library is just a portal. Seattle Library portal is much larger. They have a bigger selection but also sometimes a bigger wait time.
The library has application forms out in the children's area for Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library, as well as a poster of Dolly.
It was a very enlightening and educational program! Everyone was very engaged and had some great questions.
Patsy provided inspirational quotes about leadership.
Rosalyn Carter –
A leader takes people where they want to go.
A great leader takes people where they don't necessarily want to go, but ought to be.
Eleanor Roosevelt --
You gain strength, courage, and confidence in every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face.
You must do the thing you think you cannot do.
Tom Peters --
Mastery is great, but even that is not enough. You have to be able to change course without a bead of sweat or remorse.
Being a Rotarian makes me feel proud that that is what all of us here are inspired to do.
Audrey’s closing remarks:
The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others. -- Ghandi
The best way to find yourself is to lose yourself in the service of others. -- Ghandi