Library Day in the Life - Post #3

Sorry for the delay in putting this post up but I was a tad exhausted after work and then my daughter took over the computer to play games.

I started the day with an hour and half drive to our library service HQ where one of our book suppliers was coming to visit. The deal is the book supplier brings many many boxes of books and the regional librarian, the coordinator of the other branch libraries and I go through and select which ones we'd like to purchase for our library service.

In a past job, I did book selection for the 900 DDC area. But when I started in this position, book selection was not a part of my role. The HQ staff would select the books for the library service and branch staff would be able to have input via submission of Requests for Purchase. I really missed book selection, and there is nothing like having someone with local knowledge of their branch libraries to know what will and won't be read.

Since our new Regional Librarian started 12 months ago, I have been invited to attend book selection days. There are usually around 2 a month. Of course we use more than 2 book suppliers but these are the only 2 we have organised to visit. It can take us 2-3 hours to do this process depending on how many books we have to go through.

We have a standing order which makes the process a bit easier, and of course, large print and audio books are purchased in a different manner so we don't have to go through those formats. We are now also in the process of building a DVD collection - yes we don't have one. We must be the only library service in Australia that doesn't have a DVD collection. But now we do - albeit small - at this stage. So we will also be selecting DVDs.

The process we go through is the book supplier will show us all the adult fiction, then junior easies, junior fiction, young adult fiction, junior non-fiction and adult fiction. We pick out the ones we think we should have in the collection and other HQ staff check these against the catalogue to ensure we don't already have them.

Once selection was completed, the Regional Librarian, coordinator of other branch libraries and I had a meeting to do final preparation for Library Lovers Day and the launch of National Year of Reading which is happening on 14 February. We then headed to the local pub for our $10 lunch specials - the pub is actually a nice place to eat as we eat on the verandah that overlooks a river.

After lunch I packed up the boxes to take back to my branches, had a look at some draft posters for an activity we are running this year and bid farewell. Back in my main branch library it had been raining fairly steadily all day and the staff had discovered a leak in one of the skylights - unfortunately there were some stock that did not fair well. The leak is something I will have to follow up with facilities staff today as they didn't make it over yesterday. The river is once again up so I was lucky that my relief staff made it as they live on the other side of the river which gets cut off from the main part of town.

It has been raining fairly heavily for most of last night but I have checked river heights and it looks like the bridge has not gone under.

On my way home I got a call from said relief staff who said that the local Steiner school had called and asked if they could use the library study rooms to run their school tomorrow as they are flooded out - i.e. they can't get to their school. So I look forward to approx. 40 odd students in the library tomorrow!!