• Colorado Histories
• Tech Help
• Tools for Tough Times

There is much more work to be done, because the CVL will never truly be done. It is designed to be ever-changing, evolving, and improving. We hope you love it, but of course are open to constructive criticism.

Stay tuned!

• Jim Duncan, Colorado State Library – Community Builder
• Erin Meyer, DU-Penrose – Marketer
• Joseph Sanchez, Red Rocks Community College, Marvin Buckels Library – Innovator
• Diane Walden, Colorado State Library – Advocate
• Donna Walker, Arapahoe Library District – Advocate
• Aspen Walker, Douglas County Libraries – Marketer

“For ten years now, Library Journal’s Movers & Shakers has been spotlighting librarians and others in the library field who are doing extraordinary work to serve their users and to move libraries of all types and library services forward. We’re proud to recognize their achievements—and to encourage you to be inspired by their vision and optimism and turn their ideas into fodder for your own innovative work,” says Library Journal.

The bar chart explains which e-reader devices people are thinking about purchasing. Nook=Purple, Sony Reader =Salmon, iPad =Gold, Kindle = Blue .
82% of folks decided that they would be willing to pay between $125 – $175 for a device, and 71% said that they would be interested in purchasing one to five readers in the above price range.
A few additional e-readers that librarians were musing about are the Kobo and the Pandigital.
Additional comments:
Compatibility issues were the main topic in the comments section. Librarians want the device to work well with OverDrive (mentioned a lot, and Net Library was mentioned a few times).
Several librarians said they would like to purchase a device for staff training first before they allowed the device to be checked out.
Librarians commented that they would really like to know more about the devices, and specifically how to check them out to patrons.
The cost of the device itself along with the cost of titles were also mentioned as a factor in purchasing a device.
Academic libraries were curious about loading textbooks on the device.
A few libraries responded that they already circulating the devices at their library.

In conclusion, e-readers are a hot topic. Librarians see the value in providing handling assistance if not downright access to books via the devices. Are you thinking of providing an e-reader device for your patrons in the near future? If so, tell us about it by clicking on the comment button above.

As mentioned a couple of weeks ago, the Next Generation Colorado Virtual Library will be in part a showcase and a repository of some of the amazing stuff you’re doing across Colorado. In order to highlight your greatness, we need to find out about and grab whatever it is you’re creating out there in libraryland. To that end, we’ll be asking you to send us your content periodically, so that we can tweak it, web-ify it, and present it to the world. The first module we’re tackling is technology training, and we want the best technology training material libraries in Colorado have to offer!

What We Want

We trust you know what your patrons need better than we do, so we plan to devise content areas once we take a look at what gets submitted. We have some ideas (see “More on ‘Content’” below!), but we want this module to be a reflection of what your patrons are clamoring for. So, think through all of the handouts, web pages, and tip sheets you’ve shared with your patrons. Which of them are most in demand? Which of them are you most proud of? Have you devised complete lesson plans for workshops that are well-attended by your community? These are the things we want to get a look at! Send links! Send PDFs! Send Word docs and screencasts and YouTube videos! We’re format agnostic – send us everything you have that you think might be relevant.

What We’ll Do with Your Content

Once we’ve gathered together a collection of materials, we’ll start sifting through the content to find the best bits and pieces from everything submitted. From there, we’ll move forward with modifying and adapting them for the web and tweaking them for consistency. It is quite possible that we’ll borrow some screenshots from one library, a little text from another, and an exercise from another and bring it all together into one web-friendly training piece. In cases where multiple libraries have contributed content to one training piece, credit will be given to all libraries. In case this last point is lost on you—if we use your library’s content, your library gets credit. Remember, we’re trying to highlight your greatness!

Sharing: What You Need to Know

One of the driving philosophies behind the Next Gen CVL is to encourage widespread, rampant sharing. Viral sharing, even. To that end, we ask that before you submit anything, you take the following points into consideration.

• Anything you share with us will be modified to be applicable to the widest audience possible
• Anything posted on the CVL will have a Creative Commons Attribution – Share Alike license slapped on it. This means that other libraries or organizations will be free to further remix and distribute your training material to accommodate their patron base.
• When appropriate/possible, the original works from your libraries will be linked to directly from the CVL

Sharing sounds nice, doesn’t it? We hope so!

More on “Content”

As mentioned above, we expect you know what your patrons need better than we do. However, we’d like to have the content for this CVL module be task-driven or audience-targeted as much as possible. So while “How to use flickr” is probably valuable, something like “Using flickr to connect families” is more in the spirit of what we’re trying to get at. We want users to come to the CVL when they need to do something. Having action-oriented technology training materials is just one of the ways we hope to achieve that. So, some things to think about:

• Specific tasks in productivity software (e.g. not “How to use MS Word,” or “How to use Excel,” but “How to use tables to format a resume in MS Word” and “Creating formulas in Excel”)
• Task related guides for the web (e.g. not “How to search the web” but “Finding great health info on the web” or “Discovering job opportunities on the web”, or the flickr example above)

It’s also important to remember that a lot of our library patrons have some very simple needs (tutorials on how to use a mouse are definitely still needed), while others may have much more advanced or complicated needs. We hope to have content to appeal to users at all levels, so even if you think what you have is too basic or too advanced for most folks, send it anyway!

What Do You Need?

Remember too that the tech consultants here at the State Library will be creating material for this module as well. Not to mention, a library right up the highway from you may have exactly what you need, and would probably be glad to share. If you’ve got a big gap in the training materials available at your library, let us know in the comments below. Help us find it by commenting below! Let us know what you think by commenting below!

Sounds great! How do I share?!

If you’re ready to start sharing your content or have more questions, feel free to email Shelly Drumm at drumm_m AT cde.state.co.us or to comment below.  We can’t wait to see what you’ve got to offer, Colorado!

Spanish Peaks launched their new Plinkit website on election Tuesday, to offer their patrons 24/7 access to the information, and tools they need. Website features include access to the library catalog, library events and online resources. Additionally, the Library Return on Investment Calculator helps market the value of library services to their users.

For more information about Plinkit, and how this website creation and hosting service run by the Colorado State Library can benefit your library, visit http://colibraries.org/  or contact Christine Kreger at kreger_c@cde.state.co.us.

When the Colorado Virtual Library (CVL) was launched over a decade ago, it was a new and exciting resource, unlike anything available in the Colorado library community at that time. But times have changed, and we regret to confess, the CVL hasn’t. The way that we use the internet and the kinds of tools available to us are changing at a breakneck pace, and the rate of change is only accelerating. It’s with all of this in mind that we’re approaching a complete redesign of the CVL.

Our Approach

While technical decisions are still in the works, we know we’ll be building an ever-changing collection of content modules (more on that in a minute!) around a central core of heavily-used library services such as AskColorado’s awesome 24/7 reference service, SWIFT interlibrary loan (soon with more patron-initiated functionality!), and access to valuable digital collections. Those content modules will be developed on an as-needed basis, allowing us to be more responsive to your needs and those of your patrons.

The content your patrons need, when they need it

We plan to launch the CVL with three robust content collections:

• Tools for Tough Times
  We’ve got some people in the State Library working on compiling some of these with the hope that they will allow you to respond to your patrons’ requests for help in navigating these uncertain times.
• Famous Coloradan Biographies
  Colorado schoolchildren are often on the hunt for kid-centric Colorado historical information, and while there are several collections of this sort around the state, we’re hoping to bring them all together and present them in such a way that exposes the fantastic digital collections around the state as well.
• Technology Training Materials for Your Patrons
  You don’t always have the time or resources to develop great training materials for your patrons. Lucky for you, we plan to gather ‘em up from libraries across the state, and deliver them to you and your patrons from one central location.

Over time, useful new modules and practical tools will be added. We’ll be listening to you, and responding to what you’re seeing on the front lines in the work you’re doing with your patrons.

What We’ll Need From You

We can’t do something like this in isolation, folks. We’re asking that you contribute materials and tools you’ve devleoped in your libraries, and let us show them to the world! Maybe you have a volunteer who has meticulously documented the real-world experience of applying for and managing unemployment benefits. Maybe your resident tech junkie has written up a guide for setting up a first webmail account that your senior patrons are crazy about. Maybe Alferd Packer is your local Famous Coloradan, and you’ve got great bios and more sketched up. If you’re willing to share, we’ll adapt your content for use on the Next Generation Colorado Virtual Library.

What’s In It For You

Of course, the privilege of sharing with the larger Colorado community is a benefit in and of itself, but we want to give you the credit you deserve. While we do want to take your content and republish it on our website, we want to cite and link back to you, ultimately building a resource that will show the people (and did we mention the voters?!) of Colorado the tangible value that libraries across the state are creating in their communities. We want to bring more exposure to the awesome work you’re already doing and the cool stuff you’re creating!

Next Steps

As we get our ducks in a row, we’ll be putting out calls for content. We have a list of biographies we need to amass, technologies we need training materials for, and more. We’ll be putting out more targeted calls, one by one for all of this and more, so keep an eye on libnet and other listservs as well as here on Colorado Libraries. In the meantime, give some serious thought to how you and your colleagues might be able to contribute to the content modules outlined above, and feel free to either comment below or email Shelly Drumm (drumm_m AT cde.state.co.us) with those ideas, as well as your ideas for future modules. We’ll be keeping a running list!

Last year, OITP’s America’s Libraries for the 21st Century Subcommittee launched the “cutting-edge” contest to showcase libraries that serve their communities with novel and innovative methods and to provide the library community with some successful models for delivering quality library services in new ways.

Christine Lind Hage, chair of the subcommittee, said the wide response to the 2009 call was so inspiring, the subcommittee knew another contest was in order. Last year, three libraries were cited for their outstanding work.

“These winners showed that libraries of all sizes can do innovative projects that are worthy of replication across library types,” Hage said.

“With all the creative technological work being done in libraries, I’m sure that this year we’ll see some exciting apps, projects or services that we’ll want to showcase.”

Nominations should be sent to the American Library Association, Office for Information Technology Policy, 1615 New Hampshire Avenue NW, 1st Floor, Washington, D.C. 20009 or to ainouye@alawash.org by November 1, 2010.  Details for the nomination process are available on the OITP website.

Now’s your chance to witness six public library directors answer surprise questions on-the-fly. Sit back, enjoy your lunch and watch the spectacle unfold…

Lunch & Learn Super Summit: Public Library Directors

Friday, September 24 at Noon

Philip S. Miller Library

100 S. Wilcox

Castle Rock, CO 80104

Featuring: Shirley Amore (Denver Public Library), Kari Baumann (Elbert County Library District), Jamie LaRue (Douglas County Libraries), Eloise May (Arapahoe Library District), Bob Pasicznyuk (Cedar Rapids Public Library, IA), and Marcellus Turner (Jefferson County Public Library).

Presented by the Douglas County Libraries New Professionals Committee. The Committee will select the surprise questions.

The panel will have five minutes to consider the questions, and 45 minutes to discuss.

Free. Please bring your own lunch.

RSVP requested: http://bit.ly/amiTb1

Bring along your friends! Promote the event! A flier is available for download at http://bit.ly/c3cOQyQuestions? awalker@dclibraries.org