Tag: professional development

Administrative and Management Skills

Learn A New Skill: Creating Meaningful Staff Training and Support

| Jaime Eastman|Leave a comment
Blue text reads Learn a New Skill. Under a blue line, the additional text Creating Meaningful Staff Training and Support appears in black. To the left of the text is the outline of a lightbulb inside a gear. To the right of the text is the outline of a gear with tools.

This year, I’m viewing “traditional” New Year’s resolutions through a library lens. This year’s resolutions include ways to exercise more, live life to the fullest, eat healthier, lose weight, save money, and get organized. This month, we’re focusing on ourselves and different ways to learn new skills. Library programs are all about connecting patrons to ideas and resources to build their skills, but are we doing enough to support ourselves and our staff? Staff does their best work when they feel supported, prepared, and empowered to learn. We must create cultures that support continuous learning and meaningful growth beyond mandatory training. We’ll discuss ways to find and build meaningful, actionable training that inspires your staff and helps your library thrive. Learning doesn’t stop when we have a particular title or have hosted a certain program. Thoughtful training opportunities create more resilient staff, stronger programs, and better experiences for everyone.

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Blogger Eleanor Howell-Shryock

Professional Development that Actually Sticks

| Eleanor Howell-Shryock|Leave a comment

Finding the time and funding to support your professional development can be a challenge! As professionals in a field dedicated to lifelong learning, it is vital to seek out training and conferences to grow our skills and inspire new ideas. Once you’ve snagged that coveted registration spot, your real work begins. As a Librarian for a small city library, attending training and conferences often means hearing about initiatives on a scale I’d dare not imagine. Don’t let this scare you! If you’ve ever steered clear of a training because the idea seemed too big, or you didn’t feel you’d have the support to bring it to your library, this blog is for you! As a trainer and a trainee, I’ve heard both sides of frustrations around conferences and training. Beyond preferences in format and delivery, attendees commonly lament that there are no immediate actionable ideas for their library, or that they don’t…

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Blogger Ariel Barreras

Tips and Tricks for New Children’s Librarians!

| Ariel Barreras|Leave a comment

If you are reading this, I want to start off by saying CONGRATULATIONS on becoming a Children’s Librarian! This is an incredibly rewarding field and I am happy that you have joined this community. I have been working in libraries for 7 years, almost exclusively in Children’s Services. I worked my way up from a Library Assistant to the Head of Children’s Services. Through my experience, I have learned so much and continue to learn every day. If you’re a new Children’s Librarian, here are some tips and tricks to get you started!

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ALSC Online Courses

The Benefits of an ALSC Membership from the Perspective of a Longtime YALSA Member 

| ALSC Membership Committee|1 Comment

I have been a Teen Services Librarian for over 15 years, and a member of YALSA for 13 years. Recently I decided to expand my youth services knowledge and joined ALSC. I have found the resources in ALSC to be helpful in my professional growth. In honor of ALSC and YALSA’s reunification, here are three amazing resources available to ALSC members that have helped me as a Teen Librarian!  Online Course and Webinars  Just like YALSA, ALSC offers exclusive free access to webinars and online courses. While the content of these recordings are more focused on children’s services, there are many that are relevant to teen services as well. Webinars I found helpful include Training Frontline Staff to Deal with Book Challenges Effectively and Out-of-School Time: How to Plan STEAM Programming in Your Library.   Notable Children’s Book List and Recommended Book Lists  ALSC’s Notable Children’s Books is a curated list…

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Awards & Scholarships

Calling all Applicants for the Bechtel Fellowship!

| ALSC Professional Recognition and Scholarship Committee|Leave a comment

As back-to-school dialog sneaks into all corners of life, do you find yourself reminiscing about the fun of it all? Fresh pens, pencils, folders, and backpack. New teachers and classmates. And, of course, library time. The Louise Seaman Bechtel Fellowship offers the opportunity to feel all that joy again with an added bonus – awardees study the topic of their choosing and their final work will not be graded. The Louise Seaman Bechtel Fellowship provides a grant up to $7,500 to a qualified children’s librarian to spend up to four weeks reading and studying at the Baldwin Library of Historical Children’s Literature of the George A. Smathers Libraries, University of Florida, Gainesville. The Baldwin Library contains a special collection of 130,000 volumes of children’s literature published mostly before 1950. The fellowship is endowed in memory of Louise Seaman Bechtel and Ruth M. Baldwin. If you’re finding yourself curious to learn…

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Administrative and Management Skills

The Self-Care Shelf: Handling Change with Grace

| Jaime Eastman|1 Comment
A black book cart shelf shows a weeding manual, a box of tissues, a calendar, a pad of sticky notes, and a Stitch pen.

Change is an inevitable, if uncomfortable, part of library life. Whether it’s a staffing shift, program pivot, budget redistribution, or full-blown reorganization, change disrupts our rhythms. While we can’t stop those changes, we can choose our response. Over time (and with plenty of practice), I’ve built a small but sturdy self-care shelf. These tools help me manage change with more grace and less burnout. I still struggle with change, but returning to this shelf keeps me grounded. As ALSC heads into a season of transition, I want to share five items from my shelf. Perhaps they’ll help you, too.

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Blogger School-Age Programs and Service Committee

DIY-Style PD: Refresh, Reflect, and Rebuild Your Practice

| School-Age Programs and Services Committee|Leave a comment

Perhaps your professional development (PD) toolbox is feeling a little dusty due to underuse, or maybe some tools have become dull from overuse. As librarians, we recognize the importance of lifelong learning. We also acknowledge that when time is short, money is tight, and the day-to-day demands pile up, it can be hard to focus on our own professional growth. Life gets busy, and professional FOMO can creep up. You do not have to start from scratch. It can be easy to overthink and overlook resources already at your disposal; sometimes a trusted tool just needs sharpening or oiling. This is an invitation to take an inventory, sketch your blueprint, and get back to (re)building your professional practice. Gather your crew You may be the only children’s librarian in your building, but you are not alone. What do you want to learn or share with others? What are your areas…

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