LIS Roadtrip…It’s Time to Hit the Road!

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It’s not too late to jump on the YALSA Road Trip! Our focus this year is getting into ALA accredited Library Schools, and getting those up and coming librarians involved in YALSA. For those of us who are teen oriented, working with teens in libraries is a no-brainer, but this is a chance to bring the word to the next crop of librarians coming into the work force. Any library school student or faculty member can volunteer their time and get a program going in their school.

As you may have seen in the YALSA eNews, there are plenty of materials available to anyone who wants to have a YALSA event at their school. A road trip event is what you make of it- invite students, school librarians and public librarians to come together for a coffee klatch and start networking, share information about YALSA and how to get involved in serving teens on a national level with others, or share ideas about teen programming and services. The possibilities really are only limited by your imagination.

The YALSA Road Trip website has a free toolkit available to download, some ideas to get you started, and other resources you can use to make your event a success. Sign up and tell us what you’re planning on doing this year!

Get Some Help with Teen Read Week!

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Do you have a great Teen Read Week program idea?’ ‘  Team Teen Read Week is offering up’ ten mini-grants to needy libraries’ that can be used for programming, teen resources and teen services.’ Each recipient of the grant will recieve $450 cash as well as $50 in’  Teen Read Week products! Applying is simple- YALSA members just need to fill out ‘ an application and send it to’ yalsa@ala.org ‘ by June 1st, 2010. Recipients will be notified in August 2010.

The mini-grant guidelines and the application are available at ‘ http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/yalsa/teenreading/trw/trw2010/minigrant.cfm. If you have questions please contact yalsa@ala.org!

Dollars and Sense #18: Making the Most of Volunteers

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You always seem to need one when there aren’t any around, and you always seem to have too many when there isn’t anything for them to do! What are they? Volunteers! This is all especially true of teen volunteers, who range from the bored-nothing-else-to-do variety to the I-need-sixty-hours-of-community-service-for-Honor-Society sect. So how do you make the most of them (and manage to keep your sanity in the process?) Read More →

Dollars and Sense #10: DIY Holiday Wrapping Paper

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If there’s one thing that most teens love it’s creating some kind of craft at the library. We all know that craft programs are always a big hit. But in this economy, where are we supposed to come up with materials for craft programs when we can barely cover our collection budgets and other essentials? ‘ One of the beautiful things about crafts is that pretty much anything can be used in them, and if you can get your teens to bring in a few essentials from home you can put on a pretty amazing program.

Read More →

Have a great program for Teen Read Week? Share it!

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We had an awesome chat Wednesday night about Teen Read Week and shared some great ideas for programming and promotion. If you weren’t able to make it to the chat it isn’t too late to share your own! You can go to the Teen Read Week page on the YALSA wiki (http://tinyurl.com/mo23rd) and add program ideas, check out booklists, and find out what other libraries are doing around the country.

There’s still time to register for Teen Read Week if you haven’t already done that, too. Just go to the Teen Read Week page at www.ala.org/teenread and click on Registration!

It’s Time to Start Thinking about Teen Read Week!

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Many of us are working on budgets for next year and are already planning our fall programs. You know that that means- it’s time to start thinking about Teen Read Week! This year’s Teen Read Week is October 18-24th. The theme this year is Read Beyond Reality, which opens the door to all sorts of fun ideas involving everything from Science Fiction to alternate reality. Strapped for programming ideas? Visit the Teen Read Week website to spark some creativity and access all sorts of great resources!