July 2005

In this aliaPUBNEWS broadcast:

States and territories
Bookstart for babies in the ACT; Churchill Fellowship for SA public librarian; iPod competition promotes databases in SA; Homework help for recently-arrived migrants; Queensland online database challenge

Policy and advocacy
Review of interlibrary resource sharing code; Missing e-government publications; National Simultaneous Storytime 2005; Australians' use of e-government services; Libraries are loud: but who's listening?; Books Alive 2005

News from ALIA
Ideas for celebrating Children's Book Week 2005; Power searching with the pros workshops

International
Book lending, reading trends and more in the UK

States and territories

Bookstart for babies in the ACT
Since its introduction in 2003 in the ACT, approximately 6750 'Bookstart for babies' kits have been distributed to help increase childhood literacy. Parents of newborns receive a kit that is provided in a reusable cloth library bag and features a board book; a booklet of rhymes and activities for use with children; a booklet on the benefits of reading to children; information on the services and resources the ACT Public Library provides to parents; and other appropriate publications. This initiative has been modelled on the UK bookstart program, where research has shown recipients are consistently performing better at school than the control group.
http://www.library.act.gov.au

Churchill Fellowship for SA public librarian
Congratulations to Janice Nitschke who has been awarded a Churchill Fellowship for 2005. Janice has been awarded the Professor Jean Primrose Whyte Churchill Fellowship to study the evolving role of the public library in the community and how they participate in community initiatives with the goal of service integration. She will study library services in the UK, Norway, Finland, Denmark, Canada and the USA. Janice is director, Library and Information Services, Wattle Range Council, SA, is president of Public Libraries SA and is a member of ALIA's Public Libraries Reference Group.

iPod competition promotes databases in SA
In Library and Information Week 2005, PLAIN co-ordinated a marketing campaign aimed at the youth market aimed at encouraging use of http://www.libraries.sa.gov.au and promoting access to two state-wide databases, EBSCO Magazine Bank and Thomson Gale Health and Wellness. A simple competition was run with three iPod shuffles as prizes. Over 1100 entries were received. [PCS newsletter, June 2005]
http://www.plain.sa.gov.au/

Homework help for recently-arrived migrants
The Assisted Homework Pilot Program for recently-arrived secondary school aged migrants and refugees was launched officially at Knox Library (Vic) on 27 July 2005. The students, some of whom have had less than two years schooling before coming to Australia, bring their school homework to each session, which also includes games and social opportunities. They work with volunteer tutors who have been trained by the Adult Migrant Education Service. The sudents learn more than English through the program. They learn how to use the library and to take part in a range of community and youth programs.
http://www.knox.vic.gov.au/

Queensland online database challenge
The State Library of Queensland is again running the Online Database Challenge competition to promote the electronic resources available free of charge to Queenslanders through their public libraries. The competition runs from 11 July to 28 August 2005 and asks Queenslanders to answer four questions by searching the Thomson Gale Health and Wellness Resource Center and Literature Resource Center databases. The prize for the winner is a notebook computer.
http://www.slq.qld.gov.au/

Policy and advocacy

Review of interlibrary resource sharing code
ALIA's Interlibrary Lending Expert Advisory Group is co-ordinating a sector-wide review of the Australian Interlibrary Resource Sharing (ILRS) Code. Interested libraries, organisations and individuals are invited to contribute to the review. A discussion paper addressing the purpose and principles of the Code, service-level standards and recommended pricing has been issued by the Advisory Group. The deadline for comment is 31 August 2005.
http://alia.org.au/interlibrary.lending/

Missing e-government publications
Librarians are concerned about government publications that were published on the internet but have now disappeared or where links no longer work. This is also a growing problem for researchers in Australia who have reported problems in tracking down government reports originally published on the web but which have now become unavailable or difficult to find. The PANDORA digital archive is investigating, on a trial basis until the end of August 2005, the status of these missing e-government publications. If you know of a missing e-government publication and can provide some details, please report it to Margaret Phillips, Director Digital Archiving, National Library of Australia, mphillips@nla.gov.au.nospam. Please provide as much information as possible, for example, exact title, corporate author and any other author, the original URL and any subsequent URL, even if this is also now defunct. The more details that are available, the more likely that it is that they will be able to confirm its status as missing or perhaps locate it at some other source and ascertain its history.

National Simultaneous Storytime 2005
It's gooey, brewy, yummy, chewy - yes it's Wombat Stew! Celebrating its 21st anniversary this year, 'Wombat stew' [by Marcia Vaughan] is the selected picture book to be read for National Simultaneous Storytime (NSS) 2005. NSS will take place on Friday 2 September 2005 at 11:00am AEST and registrations have now opened. This year, ALIA is offering participants an exclusive NSS activity promotion pack to participate in the event. For just $27.95, you will receive a hardback, 21st anniversary edition of 'Wombat stew' along with an exclusive 'Wombat stew' activity promotion pack containing posters, bookmarks, balloons, a guide for readers theatre, craft ideas, and a media kit for promoting NSS in your library. A pack containing merchandise only and a pack containing fifty Wombat stew balloons is also available to purchase.
http://alia.org.au/advocacy/storytime/2005/

Australians' use of e-government services
A report commissioned by the Australian Government Informaton Management Office (AGIMO) gives a snapshot of how Australians use e-government services and how satisfied they are with them. The study covers federal, state, territory and local governments. It examines people's preferences for certain services and contact methods including phone, face-to-face and the internet. The study found that seventy per cent of Australian adults had used the internet in the past year and that forty per cent of these had used it to contact a government agency. Launching the report, Senator Eric Abetz, Special Minister of State, said 'Traditional methods of contact are still important, but there is a growing demand for services to be delivered online.' [AGIMO, Australian's use of and satisfaction with e-government services, 2005] The report is available at:
http://www.agimo.gov.au/publications/2005/june/e-government_services

Libraries are loud: but who's listening?
The inaugural Public Libraries Australia Conference will be held in Albury, NSW on 9-11 November 2005. The conference is titled 'Libraries are loud (but who's listening: Aggregate, advocate, advance' to demonstrate that public libraries are important community facilities that assist in building communities and doing fantastic things for our constituents, but are we attracting the right listeners (in terms of political decision-makers who can influence the future direction of our sector)? A stimulating program will address some of the issues confronting public libraries. For more information please contact the Conference Secretariat, PO Box 314, Wodonga VIC 3689, ph 02 6022 9100, fx 02 6024 1716, or visit the PLA Conference website. Earlybird registration offers considerable savings and is open until 31 August.
http://www.pla.org.au

Books Alive 2005
On 28 July 2005, the Minister for the Arts and Sport, Senator Rod Kemp, launched the federal government's 2005 'Books Alive' initiative. 'Books Alive' promotes books and reading to all Australians in a guide to fifty books selected by a team of industry experts. The 'Books Alive great read guide' claims to offer something for all tastes and interests, for those looking for a new read, or those wanting to rediscover the joys of reading. A free copy of Matthew Reilly's 'Hell Island' will be on offer to all those who buy a book from the guide during the campaign, which finishes in late August. Some 2.5 million copies of the 'Books Alive great read guide' will be distributed across the country, including to libraries.
http://www.booksalive.com.au

News from ALIA

Ideas for celebrating Children's Book Week 2005
On 30 June 2005, the ALIA Children and Youth Services (NSW) group hosted the annual Pre-Bookweek Extravaganza when children's librarians and teacher-librarians got together to brainstorm ways to promote and enjoy the titles shortlisted for Children's Book Week [20-26 August 2005]. For a wealth of ideas for promoting the shortlisted books see:
http://alia.org.au/groups/cysnsw/book.week/2005/

Power searching with the pros workshops
ALIA and Web Search Pacific will co-host 'Power searching with the pros' workshops with Mary Ellen Bates and Chris Sherman in Melbourne (29-30 Aug), Canberra (1-2 Sep) and Sydney (5-6 Sep) 2005. For those who have already attended Web Search Pacific workshops, the new series will include a totally-new advanced workshop. LEVEL 1 is a one-day workshop that introduces the main concepts that you need to know when searching the web. LEVEL 2 is the new one-day advanced workshop for those who have already attended previous Web Search Pacific workshops. For more information and details about how to register:
http://alia.org.au/events/

International

Book lending, reading trends and more in the UK
The Summer 2005 issue of 'Public library journal', the journal of the Public Libraries Group of the Chartered Insitute of Library and Information Professionals includes several interesting articles: a study of the decline in adult book-lending from UK public libraries; evaluation of the first national public library book promotion in Wales; and an essay on the concept of community cohesion and the role of libraries. There is a brief report on reading groups for people with disabilities at Dewsbury and Huddersfield libraries. The journal has also introduced your aliaPUBNEWS editor to a new type of library professional, that of 'bibliotherapist' who prescribes books instead of medicine to help reduce stress, anxiety and depression. [Public library journal, Summer 2005, ISSN 0268-893X]

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