Contributions to the Weekly Wrap-up are from all SWKLS staff.
On the calendar
No Directors Forum for the Month of December
November 26 & 27 – System Office Closed for Thanksgiving Holiday
December 2 – Target date for the State Library to complete transfer of all audiobook purchases to the Cloud Library.
December 4 – Full Board Meeting (Online with Zoom)
December 9 – Verso/Auto-Graphics Q & A Session. Registration Link
December 11 – Richard, Jody, and Kelly will visit Seward Community College.
December 16 – Verso/Auto-Graphics Q & A Session. Registration Link
December 24, 25, & 28 – System Office Closed for Christmas Holiday
January 5, 2021 – Directors Forum
January 15, 2021 – Full Board Meeting (Online with Zoom) at 10:00 am
KPERS:
If you haven’t already, you should be receiving an e-mail from KPERS to verify your service quarters for the 2021 year. You must verify and submit service quarter info, even if you don’t make any changes. Submit to KPERS by November 20, 2020.
State Library of Kansas Digital Content (cloudLibrary):
Learn how to find audiobooks on cloudLibrary with this tutorial.
Download your RBdigital user data, including your current checkouts, holds, history, and wishlist, by following the instructions found in this tutorial. This process will download a file that you can use to manually recreate your holds and wishlist on your cloudLibrary account. Data cannot be imported into cloudLibrary from this file.
Since our current holds list will be completely purged with the transfer (from RB Digital), we have currently reduced the limit on holds to 1. Additionally, we’ve reduced the number of active checkouts from 10 down to 5 and will continue to gradually reduce this number as the transfer date approaches.
We’ve recently learned that any audiobooks that you have checked out on RBdigital at the time of the transfer will still be accessible through the RBdigital app and website until the loan period expires. However, you won’t be able to renew those loans or place holds on those titles on RBdigital after December 2.
Having received lots of feedback regarding the reduced loan periods, we’ve returned the length of checkouts on cloudLibrary to 3-week loan periods.
Summer (Reading) Library Program:
I have sent out a “form” for any libraries that are interested in doing the Reader Zone app again this year. If you could get that back to me by December 2, 2020, then I can forward the information to Alice Smith at the State Library.
Kansas Reads to Pre-Schoolers
The month of November is Kansas Reads to Preschoolers month. This program is set for the whole month so libraries can contact their local preschools to set up dates and times to read to the classes and/or hand out the selected book for this year which is Groovy Joe: Ice Cream and Dinosaurs written by Eric Litwin and art by Tom Lichtenheld.
Groovy Joe StoryWalkⓇ will soon be available for ILL.
Here is the link to the State Libraries webpage that contains PR content (poster, bookmarks, and Facebook Banner): https://kslib.info/1017/Kansas-Reads-to-Preschoolers
Legislative Day
Some discussion was done on how to structure Legislative Day. It looks to become another online event and if it is how will KLA entice lawmakers to join in for an online session.
The Governmental Affairs Committee has started working on a position statement for the upcoming 2021 legislative session. One major point of focus will be broadband access and availability.
Will you please consider sharing stories about broadband use? For example, just yesterday, a middle school in western Kansas had to quarantine the basketball team. Luckily the library had several circulating hotspots and was able to lend them to the students. Now those students will be able to continue school off site without skipping a beat. To me another awesome part of the story is the librarian was at the school teaching database use.
That’s a great story that will carry a big impact with our legislators. I know you have great stories and request you share them. You can send your stories to me and I will collect them for the Governmental Affairs Committee. Just email me at gsanty@ckls.org.
Thanks,
Gail
Gail Santy
Central Kansas Library System/Great Bend Public Library
Website being Redesigned/Updated:
If you visit the System’s website you will find that Jody has been working on redesigning and updating it for the office. If you haven’t seen it yet, please do and see the work she has done. It is looking nice.
End of Year Activities to Prepare for:
Before the end of the year library boards will need to make their annual GAAP resolution for the new year.
Get ready to prepare your W2’s and if you have an accountant do this for your library, get it scheduled with them before the accountant’s calendar fills up.
If you library board chooses to move funds from the 2020 budget to the 2021 budget it will need to be done at the December board meeting. If you are unsure of how this works or need wording for the motion contact the office and Richard explain how this works and work up a sample motion for your board.
Set your calendars up within Verso for 2021.
Set your budget line items for 2021 in QuickBooks if you haven’t already done so.
If your library has it’s staff use all of their vacation and sick leave within the current year you need to make sure your staff takes their time off before they loose those hours.
Courier Information
If you need to contact Caroline Handwork you will need to use her email chandwork@nekls.org. She is in the process of getting a line in her home for a telephone.
Who to contact at SWKLS
If you are uncertain who at SWKLS to contact with specific questions, we have created a sheet to assist. Here is the link to the sheet: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/14f3yUesarAyedYG7ShSyta_2-8R_WfLwioQOVUfvF4E/edit?usp=sharing
Available trainings
Auto-Graphics Q & A Dates at 10AM: 12/9, and 12/16. Registration links are above and are limited to 15 seats per session. Everyone is welcome! Any questions you have will be answered.