Tuesday, August 28, 2012

Bill Whiteside Resigns from NTLP Board of Directors

At its meeting last week, the NTLP Board of Directors accepted accepted with regret but understanding - and with appreciation of his many years of service - Bill Whiteside's resignation.

Mr. Whiteside began serving our group in the early 80s, when it was still the North Texas Library System. He witnessed the development of the nonprofit North Texas Regional Library System, Inc., and the evolution of that nonprofit as it became North Texas Library Partners and then simply NTLP


NTLP staff joins the Board in recognizing his valuable contributions to our organization and adds our grateful thanks to his wife Betty, who was Vice Chair of the transition committee in 1984-85 and have served our organization in various other capacities. Even in "retirement," they're serving our nonprofit. Their memories and experiences are already proving vital as we archive the history of the system.

Thanks, Bill and Betty!

Wednesday, August 15, 2012

Tips for Anyone New to Developing a Poster Session

NTLP received the following information from Janet Bickel-Burton (SMU Cox School of Business Library & TWU Health Sciences Library – Dallas), who co-presented a Poster Session at NTLP's TechNet 2012 conference last week. With her permission - and our thanks - we're passing the suggestions on for anyone who can use the information.

As a poster-making novice, I learned several things about how to create a custom-sized (“30”x48 or 60”x48”) poster in PowerPoint and best practices for visual presentations. 

Especially helpful were: 

Two additional discoveries: 
  • Having posters produced commercially is expensive. (TWU Library paid my printing fees & Lesley hand-trimmed the paper to size needed.) Arranging multiple pages (using photo paper) on the two bulletin boards was an acceptable alternative used by low/no-budget presenters. 
  • Handouts are worth the effort as poster viewers and presenters were rushed for time. Tip: Enlarge and print the poster in the PPT notes page view as a quick handout.

Friday, August 03, 2012

NTLP Wins 2 TSLAC Grants


It's confirmed! At today's meeting, the Texas Library & Archives Commission approved all TSLAC grant applications which had been recommended, by the grant review committee, for funding. NTLP was awarded two grants.

A TSLAC Cooperation Grant will provide funding for development of an eBook platform. As the project reaches test status, interested libraries will provide Beta testing. To learn more about this, attend TechNet 2012 where NTLP staff will provide an overview.

Building on what NTLP staff has learned through the Information Literacy component of its Libraries for Literacy program, NTLP staff applied for and won funding to equip each of 9 libraries with a collection of eReaders and tablets. The grant also will fund, for designated staff at those 9 libraries, training to prepare them for providing the petting zoo / presentations at their own libraries, thereby enabling those libraries to continue offering petting zoo / presentations even after the project ends. Details about becoming one of the 9 library sites will be broadcast as soon as they become available.

By the way ... if you're wondering what your library can do to minimize the confusion of downloading eBooks and enable library guests to find out what they think about reading eBooks, consider registering for TechNet 2012 and attending the poster session described below. (But hurry! The conference is August 9 - just days away!)


Lending eReaders at the Burleson Public Library A pilot program was developed in 2011 to lend pre-loaded eReaders to adult patrons of BPL. The program was started to increase awareness of new technology in libraries and to give patrons a chance to try out an eReader without having to purchase one themselves. Ten eReaders were loaded with content separated by genre (general fiction, non-fiction, mystery, science fiction, horror / thrillers, fantasy, romance, Christian fiction, and historical fiction / western). The eReaders were then added to the library’s OPAC, and procedures were created to check out the devices to library patrons for three-week periods. Sara Miller, Public Services Librarian Supervisor (Burleson Public Library)