News from Crystal: Teen Room Rearrangement

Hello All,

I wanted to let everyone know about the changes in the Teen Room. I was affectionately referring to it as "the teen room shuffle."  Hopefully, my email will make sense. If not, everything has been clearly labeled in there :) 

The New Book area has stayed the same, as has the Manga.  However, the comic books (AKA Heroes Comics) have been moved above the manga, facing out.  They have also been separated out between DC Comics and Marvel.  There is a handy cheat sheet over there for anyone who is unsure of which character belongs to which publisher.  Immediately to the left on the first blue shelf is where all the Graphic Novels have moved, making this corner all graphic/visual content.  Continuing along the wall on the blue shelves is Historical Fiction, Horror, and Mystery.  Fantasy has stayed where it was, but it is now followed by Science Fiction and then General Fiction and Audiobooks.  These are all the tan shelves in the middle of the room.  

The far wall near the window is now entirely Non-Fiction.  This begins with Biographies, Memoirs, and the rest of non-fiction.  It is much easier to find things over there, and it seems like it's already circulating more!

One final note: we are adding a Library of Things to the Teen Room.  This will eventually be the small blue shelf sandwiched between the work desk and the window.  Right now it holds two backpacks with a walkman and headphones, a boombox, the Teen Kindle, and Mad Magazine.  There will be more "stuff" there in the future. 

We will also be working on getting a charging station for the Teen Room again, so that anyone who needs to charge a phone or some other device can get what they need in there. 

I hope that makes sense!  If you have questions, please let me know. 

Thanks,

Crystal

Updates!

 Steve and I have many updates to share, so let's get right to them: 

1. Doublechecks 

We have decided to curtail double-checking check-ins for 3 months, starting immediately. Why are we doing this? For now, we believe this will ease the burden on front desk staff and free up that time to be spent on other valuable work.

Best practice is to simply take your time when checking in items and try to look at the screen after each beep.

If we find that problems crop up during this trial, we will consider reinstituting the procedure, but for now, it's one less thing to worry about. 

2. Personnel Policy 

Trustees have gotten the policy back from the lawyer, made some light edits, and they will officially sign and adopt the policy at the next BoT meeting. 

Once that document is officially signed, Steve will be distributing it to all of us via email.

3. Saturday Schedule 

Since Lesley and Sam have gone, we now are down to 3 full-timers. We have 6 part-timers, so we've put together a rotation, where full timers will work every third Saturday, and part-timers will work every sixth Saturday.

A set rotation will help us plan our personal lives and ensure we all work an equitable share of Saturdays. It will be posted on the big calendar later today.

We expect people will need to trade days based on other obligations, and that's fine, just let us know and mark it on the calendar. 

4. Digital Services Librarian Position 

FYI, we're holding off for now on advertising that position as it is currently written, in order to think creatively about how to best meet the needs of the library going forward.

In the meantime, Steve and I will be chiefly taking on tech assistance scheduled appointments, so forward requests for an appointment to the two of us. Stay tuned for more updates/details on this front as we hope to get more staff involved.

5. Blog 

"Stuff you should know" is still a thing. All of this will be posted there. If you have any news you want to share with the group, let me know and I'll post it there, too. (I'll post Crystal's very helpful update on the Teen Room there, e.g.).

6. Staff Meeting 

Lastly, we are planning to have an all-staff meeting soon. It will probably be on a Tuesday morning, say 9:30 and we'd open at 11AM, as we've done in the past.  

Don't forget our big staff dinner at 110 Grill next Wednesday! 

Thanks everyone! 

Steve & Scott 

 7/8/2022

A few parting instructions...

If you have a signed assessment form to be filed, please put it into one of the envelopes in the box on the office desk, write "assessment" on the outside and tape the envelope shut. One of the Trustees will file them.

Questions:
Things will certainly come up that live inside my brain and nowhere else. 
First: you probably know how to do it! Or what needs to be done! Trust yourself and your experience.
Second: check with your fellows... someone else might know the answer or can work out a good idea with you.
Third: check with Scott and/or Sam. They might have the information - or, also great people to problem-solve with.
Fourth: for anything else, Scott or Sam will reach out to me and I will search my memory banks...

Non-questions:
Please don't hesitate to text or email or call me personally! I consider every single one of you to be a dear person in my life and I would love to keep that. I even promise I will try to look at Facebook more if you are on there :-D

July/August Schedule:
Scott will be checking iSolved for time-off requests and getting those on the calendar and making sure there is coverage. If you notice uncovered times, please let him know ASAP. The Saturday rotation in August will need to be worked out. Scott will take a look.

I'm sure there were other things I was going to write here... But, all I really want to say is thank you for all these years of support, fun, joy, and going through good and tough times with me and all together. I'm a better person for knowing each of you.

See you on FB, or email, or at Library parties (please, have lots of parties!)... Or, come visit me in Chelmsford.

You have my cell number and you can always get me at lesley.kimball@gmail.com.

xoxo

 7/1/2022

A couple of months ago the Portsmouth Herald stopped publishing a Saturday paper. I think I only got the message to some people and not everyone.

We should still receive a Boston Globe and a Wall St. Journal on Saturdays.

Update to earlier Update to Tricia's hours

 6/29/2022

Tricia's hours have changed slightly:

Mondays & Wednesdays 9 AM - 2:30 PM

Tuesdays 9 AM - 3 PM

Thursdays 12 PM - 6 PM  (corrected)

Fridays stay the same (9 AM - 2 PM)

The changes are on the main calendar.

Create list of things to know

 6/27/2022

What is in Lesley's head? 

I'm trying to think of everything I can that needs to be told to someone else, or moved to a shared location. I need your help.

As you think of things that you need to know that you usually ask me for, please write on the easel pad outside of the office. Anything you notice that maybe isn't written down or saved somewhere should go on that list too. 

I really appreciate it!    --Lesley

Instructions for Libby

 6/27/2022

[this just came up the other day...]

Bobbi at the State Library has been continuing to update the instructions she has for Libby/OverDrive. You can find those here:

https://nhsl.libguides.com/nhdb/librarians

You can also get to OverDrive help (which is actually helpful) here:

https://help.libbyapp.com/en-us/index.htm

Patrons are welcome to use the OverDrive help pages. I think that the State Library pages probably describe some administrative things that only libraries can do.