Librarians Change Lives!

Wow! Two posts in two days. I must be doing well :).

Anyway, I just learned that the fabulous t-shirt I bought at ALA last year, the one with the Unshelved graphic and the tag-line, "Librarians Change Lives" is available for purchase through the ALA online store.

All proceeds to go to benefit Friends of YALSA (FOY). FOY provides funding in five distinct areas:

*Continuous Learning: creating opportunities for all members and library workers to grow through grants, providing scholarships to those in need and offering distance learning and institutes.

*Advocacy: educating members, library workers, the general public and policy makers about the importance of providing excellent library services to teens, and the critical role that library workers and libraries play in helping teens develop key literacy skills and a lifelong appreciation of reading.

*Research: guiding and promoting research in the field of young adult librarianship through grants, publications, and other means to ensure that the field of librarianship has the necessary knowledge to meet the needs of teens.

*Teen Literacy & Young Adult Literature: sponsoring literacy initiatives such as Teen Read Week, YALSA’s booklists and book awards, guaranteeing YALSA's place in the forefront of our nation's adolescent literacy campaigns.

*Planning for the Future: helping to attract new members and retain existing ones, creating public awareness campaigns, planning and carrying out new initiatives to pursue excellence in library service to young adults, and more.

Now, hurry, go buy yours today so you can be as cool as me :Þ.

There's Something to Be Said for Central Selection

I've met librarians from across the country whose libraries approach collection development from a myriad of directions. In my library, we have both central selection and branch-level selection.

Currently, due to both procedural and staff changes, I'm selecting for three branches as well as serving as a central selector.

I love my duties as a central selector. I ask for suggestions from my colleagues. I peruse the selection and review material. I rarely have trouble spending my budget. That said, as a central selector, I have specific guidelines that I must follow, and I'm generally only choosing paperback fiction. I have a wide selection within a narrow topic.

I also greatly appreciate the opportunity to select materials that are specific to my demographic. Having a healthy budget for my branch means that I can respond directly to the shifting needs in my community. Need more urban fiction? Okay, I'll find some new titles. Middle school science fair coming up? Alrightee, I've got it covered. A flexible branch budget provides nearly infinite opportunities to address the unique requirements of my branch.

Still, selecting for three branches on top of completing central selection is exhausting. It's a bit more exhausting this month as we had the added responsibility of buying our prize books for the summer reading program.

So, to reiterate: I really appreciate that I work in a library system that embraces both modes of collection development. I receive books selected by another central selector that I may never have thought of purchasing -- especially in the graphic novel area -- that are amazing choices. I'm glad that I'm not the only one buying books for my branch.

After completing two big orders for three branches and a central order for eight branches, however, I'm a bit loopy. I've read so many reviews, looked at so many covers and typed so many ISBNs in the past two weeks that I'm mildly convinced every single YA book is about the same exact thing and written by one author using 99 pseudonyms.

So, forgive the loopiness for now. Soon, I'll dive back into finishing Libba Bray's Gemma Doyle Trilogy. After I finish this series and know all there is to know about the Realms, the Order and the Rakshana, I predict I'll be refreshed and ready, once again, to conquer the glorious wealth of books available for YAs these days.

On Graphic Novels

I know nothing about graphic novels. I have happily read American Born Chinese and muscled through Blankets, but I know nothing about the substantial number of series to which my library subscribes.

I should know.

It's not that I've ignored the genre. It's not that I believe that teens should be reading books without pictures. It's that it seems like such a huge undertaking to learn about each of these novels. I understand that it's my job and my duty to know how to do readers' advisory on each of the genres in my collection, but how much of my personal reading time should this job take? I know that if I ever plan to be on a YALSA Selection Committee, I'll need to be prepared to read anywhere between 3 and 5 YA books a week.

But right now, I feel like my adult sensibilities are being tossed by the wayside by an onslaught of teen fiction, and reading about a boy who turns into a girl when doused with water and whose father turns into panda bear is asking more from me than I feel ready to give.

Diving into that big, deep pool that is graphic novels seems like more than I can handle at the moment.

Does anyone have any suggestions for making graphic novel reading more enjoyable? Or do you just want to join me in whining about the above-and-beyond forty hour work week?

2007 Printz Award Winner

American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang

Jin Wang moves with his family from San Francisco’s China Town, where he had friends to watch cartoons with every Saturday morning, to a suburb, where he is only the second Asian person in the classroom

Eventually, a third, Wei-Chen Sun, arrives from China.

Wei-Chen is brand new to America, and Jin Wang tries as hard as possible to avoid being lumped in with this boy who prefers to speak a Chinese dialect, rather than converse in English. Jin Wang just wants to fit in.

With the class bullies refusing to admit Jin Wang into classroom society, though, Wei-Chen becomes his best friend by default.

But even best friends who stick together through bullies and name calling cannot always overcome…girlfriends.

Throughout the book, there is also the growing presence of the Monkey King and the problem of cousin Chin-Kee…

Jin Wang may just want to fit-in, but at what price?

American Born Chinese by Gene Luen Yang