Author: Kaelyn Christian

My last morning at #PLA2018 has been a morning, y’all. When I arrived at the convention center, the street was blocked off by police tape and a massive law enforcement presence. It was a whole to-do, and it took me the better part of an hour to figure out if I could actually get into the building or not. Everything is fine, thank goodness, they were investigating some suspicious activity, but it made for a harried start to the day. I was worried I wouldn’t be able to make it to the first session, which is the one I’ve been most looking forward to: Eliminating Fines and Fees on Children’s Materials to Create a Win-Win for Your Library and Community. Luckily, I slid in with just a few minutes to spare. The presenters talked about eliminating barriers to service, especially for low-income families, by getting rid of late fines on…

Today, I attended the #PLA2018 session “Using Fandom to Build STEAM, Summer Camps, and Youth and Community Engagement.” I’m a huge fan of fandom, as are many librarians I know, so this seemed like it would be right up my alley. It was! But there was so much more too it, as well. First of all, one of the presenters was in full Gilderoy Lockhart character. It was amazing, and such a fantastic way to tie into their program.

Yesterday was the first official day of spring, but it sure doesn’t seem like it in Philadelphia. Today is the first day of #PLA2018, and a lot of people have been unable to get into Philadelphia because of cancelled flights, cancelled trains, etc. If you’ve been keeping an eye on PLA related issues, you likely saw that they were predicting a Nor’easter with accumulations of 8 to 12 inches. Schools, libraries, and businesses are closed today because of the threat of the storm.