In this Issue:

PRESIDENT'S CORNER
UPCOMING EVENTS
ANNOUNCEMENTS
LIBRARIAN INTERVIEW
BOOK PICK
PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS
Welcome to the North Carolina Library Association’s monthly eNewsletter! A production of the NCLA Marketing Committee, the eNewsletter is devoted to highlighting professional events and programs, librarians making exceptional differences in their communities, and how the association is working to serve YOU! Please subscribe and your feedback is always welcome.
PRESIDENT'S CORNER
I would like to start this newsletter with a shout out to two of our colleagues. Congratulations to Timothy Owens, who has been appointed our next State Librarian. The partnership with the State Library is always important for NCLA and our members and we look forward to many more wonderful collaborations.
 
Also congratulations to Lynda Kellam, our ALA Councilor, who will be taking a new position at Cornell this summer. We wish her the best of luck. She has provided strong service to NCLA over the years and that is appreciated. The executive board will be looking to fill her position starting in October. If you are interested, please let me know.
 
Speaking of the Executive Board, I would like to share highlights from Friday’s meeting as we are moving forward on some significant changes. Already announced is the departure of Kim Parrott, who has served as the Executive Assistant to the Association for many years. We discussed how the Assistant position will look moving forward. A small group of us are working on both a transition and a long-term plan for association support moving ahead. Other discussions included:
  • The approval of the 2019 budget including consideration for the assistant change and looking at new membership software.
  • We approved a motion to sign up with Wild Apricot as a membership software management system. Wild Apricot is a web-based software for small associations and non-profits to help manage membership, website, events and other activities. The idea is to run this program concurrently with our current system and migrate over by conference in October, also providing an opportunity to do some training for everyone at conference.
  • We also discussed conducting a joint conference with SELA in 2021. Details obviously need to be worked out, but we think that could be an exciting enhancement to what we offer. As a reminder, we are going back to Winston-Salem in 2021.
  • Rase also updated the board on his committee’s Librarians Build Communities programs. They raised just under $1,000 for the Samaritan ministries in donations. Thanks to all of you who contributed. LBC is also working on some exciting plans for conference.
  • Finally, and I won’t say much as to not spoil the planning committee’s fun, but our conference theme for 2019 will be “Libraries: Spaces to_______”, more info to come!!
Thanks and have a great February,
Mike
UPCOMING EVENTS
Help! I'm an Accidental Government Information Librarian: Census Sources Outside of American FactFinder
Friday, February 8 • 12 pm
Online Webinar 
 
The Government Resources Section of the North Carolina Library Association welcomes you to a series of webinars designed to help us increase our familiarity with government information. All are welcome because government information wants to be free.
 
American FactFinder can be frustrating to use, but what other sources are available? This webinar will cover both free and commercial sources of census data such as NHGIS and Social Explorer.
 
 To register please visit this link.
 
NCLA DLS Discusses!:
Partnerships and Distance Learning
Monday, February 18 • 12 pm
Online Meeting
 
 NCLA Distance Learning Section has created a series of brown bag lunch virtual meetings for librarians to get together and have a conversation about topics to do with online learning and 
e-learning.  There will be a moderator of the session, but these sessions are meant to be a conversation between a group of librarians.  They are not recorded in order to encourage open conversation. This session will be moderated by Nora Burmeister.
 
To register please visit this link.
 
 
NCLA Seeking Scholarship Applicants
Deadline: Friday, May 31, 2019
 
 
 Every biennium, NCLA awards scholarships at the annual conference.  Whether you are about to be a library school student, currently in library school, or already a librarian seeking to continue your studies, if you are getting this newsletter you are probably eligible!  The deadline for applications is May 31, 2019.
 
For more information visit this link.
 
ANNOUNCEMENTS 
 
We are pleased to announce that Timothy Owens has been named the new State Librarian of North Carolina. He brings over 25 years of experience working with libraries at the local, state, and national level.
 
Timothy grew up in Harbinger, North Carolina. He began his library career at Neuse Regional Library, followed by service at Perkins Library at Duke University and in Library Development at the State Library of North Carolina. He has served as President of the Association for Rural & Small Libraries. Timothy was a senior program officer at the Institute of Museum and Library Services in Washington, DC, before returning to North Carolina to become Assistant State Librarian in 2017. He earned his Master of Library Science at UNC-Chapel Hill and holds a master’s degree in music from Meredith College.
 
Please join us in congratulating Timothy on his new role with the State Library!
 
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From Samaritan Ministries and Librarians Build Communities, THANK YOU for making our 2018 Resource Drive a HUGE success! NC Librarians helped raise nearly $1,000 worth of necessary resources, and Samaritan Ministries’ homeless guests received the fullest gift bags Samaritan has ever given out.
 
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Randolph County Public Library Director (and past NCLA president) Ross Holt has published A Man of Restless Enterprise: The Diary of Simeon Colton, 1851-1862, through which the extraordinary tale of the Rev. Simeon Colton, D.D. (1785-1868), unfolds. In his intermittent diary, Colton documents his experiences and reflections as a teacher and Presbyterian clergyman in central North Carolina as the nation slides toward civil war. The Yale-educated Colton dedicated his life to preparing young men for college as principal of a series of private academies in Massachusetts and North Carolina. What makes the diary unique is Colton’s ability not only to recount events and observations, but also to analyze them from multiple points of view – as an educator, a scientist, a theologian.
 
Annotations and supplementary material illuminate the rich tapestry of Colton’s life, especially the amazing reach of his students, colleagues and acquaintances (for example, in Massachusetts he was the teacher of Charles Merriam, who would go on to establish The Merriam-Webster Dictionary). Accompanying the diary are definitive profiles of Colton and his extraordinary children, who made significant contributions of their own — evidence of the power of a family that places a supreme value on education. Of special interest to North Carolina and Presbyterian history collections, A Man of Restless Enterprise is available via Amazon; proceeds go to the Randolph Room, the local history and genealogy service of the Randolph County Public Library.
 
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New website coming soon!
 
This year, NCLA is migrating our membership platform and website to Wild Apricot. It will take us a few months to completely transition and we plan to be fully migrated to the new platform by June 1, 2019. What does this mean for you? It mean a brand new website that makes it easier to find the information you need and a streamlined way to manage your NCLA membership and event registration. Stay tuned for more information!
 
LIBRARIAN INTERVIEW
Nora Brumeister
Online Learning and Electronic Services Librarian
Central Carolina Community College
 
1. What was the first library job you had that made the little voice in your head go, “Yes—I have found the profession for me!”
 
My first experience with libraries was running an ABE/ESL library at Clark College in Vancouver, WA. That was one of the first jobs I’d ever had where I was able to clearly see the direct positive impact that libraries have on their patrons. One day, a student I had been working with and supplying with GED study materials came in to talk to me and told me, through tears, that she’d gotten her GED and with it, a better job, and because of this, her 3 year old son was going to have a Christmas tree for the first time in his life. She hugged me and thanked me for all the help I had given her, and that was it - I was hooked.
 
2. What part of your job keeps you going to work every day? How do you continue to find inspiration and passion in the library field?
 
 I love my job because it’s wildly different from day to day. It allows me to indulge so many aspects of my personality - my analytic side is satiated by managing online database access and usage statistics, I can express my creativity by creating innovative instructional sessions, and my curiosity is stimulated by getting to explore obscure reference questions with patrons. But ultimately the thing that keep me engaged and coming back to work is the same thing that hooked me on libraries in the first place - getting to lend assistance to the amazing community college patrons who are actively trying to better their lives. Seeing them succeed in their personal and professional goals and knowing I played a small part in that success gives my job so much meaning and at the end of the day, makes me feel like I’ve made the world a slightly better place.
 
 3. Who are your library heroes in North Carolina and beyond?
 
 North Carolina is a treasure trove of incredible librarians, and I feel very lucky to have had the opportunity to work with some really amazing professionals. At my local level, Samantha O’Connor and the work she does with library instruction is constantly inspiring - she is always looking for (and finding!) ways to make our CCCC library instruction more engaging and more relevant to our students, and through our collaborations, she pushes me to integrate active learning into everything we do. Outside of CCCC, my NC library heroes are Sam Harlow (UNC-G), Kate Hill (UNC-G), and Amanda Glenn-Bradley (UNC-A). All three of them are incredibly competent professionals, but what inspires me most about these women is the way they infuse their day to day library responsibilities with emotional intelligence and compassion. They not only connect with and serve the academic needs of their patrons, but also recognize the human needs of patrons - I’m always floored by the compassion they bring to their positions, and they inspire me to do the same. On a national level, my library hero (who I’m also fortunate to count among my personal mentors), is Rebecca Marrall at Western Washington University. Rebecca is one of the kindest and most capable librarians I’ve ever met, and works tirelessly to make sure that the WWU library systems work seamlessly together to serve all students regardless of ability level or personal expertise. She is a model of the type of librarian I’d like to be - she somehow manages to balance being incredibly prolific in scholarship and service with being an emotionally intelligent leader at her institution.
 
4. Tell us a little about your interests and hobbies outside of the library.
 
Outside of the library I like to keep myself engaged with creative pursuits. I do some local community theatre, and I’m trying to learn the ukulele so I can accompany myself when I sing. One of my biggest passions is costuming, and I’m in the process of learning to sew so I can make my own creations instead of assembling them from disparate pieces. I love experimenting with makeup and hair and generally being a chameleon in my physical self-expression. And of course, the standard librarian answer, I love to read - I’m currently on a true crime kick, and anyone who knows me knows I will talk your ear off about serial killers if given a chance! In less morbid reading obsessions, I love philosophy and finding different ways to look at and find meaning in the world. Finally, I love spending time with my 13 year old husky mix dog, Jade.
BOOK PICK
Afrofuturism:
The world of black sci-fi and fantasy culture

by Ytasha Womack

In this hip, accessible primer to the music, literature, and art of Afrofuturism, author Ytasha Womack introduces readers to the burgeoning community of artists creating Afrofuturist works, the innovators from the past, and the wide range of subjects they explore. From the sci-fi literature of Samuel Delany, Octavia Butler, and N. K. Jemisin to the musical cosmos of Sun Ra, George Clinton, and the Black Eyed Peas’ will.i.am, to the visual and multimedia artists inspired by African Dogon myths and Egyptian deities, the book’s topics range from the “alien” experience of blacks in America to the “wake up” cry that peppers sci-fi literature, sermons, and activism. With a twofold aim to entertain and enlighten, Afrofuturists strive to break down racial, ethnic, and social limitations to empower and free individuals to be themselves.
PROGRAM HIGHLIGHTS
Looking for something new to offer?  Check out these awesome programs!
 


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