LEAGUE OF WOMEN VOTERS / Cleveland Heights – University Heights Library Board of Trustees meeting highlights [online 10-19-2015]

OCTOBER 19, 2015

  • Room named to honor Grace F. Brody
  • Sara Phillips to head the University Heights Library
  • Book Bike in the news
  • Librarian blogs successful
  • Youth services outreach
  • Friends group has new officers
  • Project manager for University Heights Library renovation
  • September public service report highlights

Board Member Susan Beatty was absent.

Room named to honor Grace F. Brody

On Dec. 21 at 7 p.m., the children’s room will be named the Grace F. Brody Children’s Room in honor of Professor Brody, who taught at CWRU’s Mandel School of Applied Social Sciences for 20 years, and left a $500,000 bequest to the library. Her academic focus was the parent-child relationship. The children’s room will contain an early literacy space to further language learning for children ages birth to 5, and similar spaces will be in all of the branches. The public is invited to attend, and light refreshments will be served.

Sara Phillips to head the University Heights Library

Phillips has been the public services manager at the East Cleveland Public Library. Pam Spangler, the interim branch manager, will return to her position as youth services librarian at the University Heights Library.

Book Bike in the news

On Sept. 4, NBC Nightly News featured a segment on the rising popularity of book bikes. The Heights Library’s Book Bike was shown in a photograph representing the Cleveland area. On Sept. 8, Youth Services Manager Sam Lapides talked about the book bike on the WCPN Sound of Ideas program focused on literacy.

Librarian blogs successful

Marketing and Community Relations Manager Sheryl Banks presented the quarterly report for the website and social media. Although most statistics held steady, she noted a 24 percent drop in the visits to the research and database page. This drop seems to parallel the reduction in visits and circulation and will be monitored and checked with other library systems. A positive increase of 16 percent in the number of people reading the blog posts that librarians make on social media is a bright spot.

Youth services outreach

Youth Services Manager Sam Lapides along with Librarians Mary Looby and Peggy Hull presented an overview of programs from Sept. 2014 to Sept. 2015. The total was 205 visits and 8,151 people reached. Examples of outreach programs are storytimes, preschool visits, deposit collections at seven schools, and visits to Heights High’s Tiger Lab.

Friends group has new officers

The group’s annual meeting on Oct. 16 was followed by the Indigenous Peoples’ Read-In, which attracted 40 students from John Hay High School. The mega-sale was held Nov. 6-9. The 2016 officers are Linda Lopez, president, Vivian Pospisil, vice-president, and Susan Ford, treasurer.

Project manager for University Heights Library renovation

The board approved the hiring of Project Management Consultants, a wholly owned subsidiary of the Thompson Hine law firm, to oversee the renovation of the University Heights Library. The following duties and costs are: owner’s representative ($85,000), legal support during selection of construction manager ($10,000), and additional hours if needed at an hourly rate.

September public service report highlights

  • The annual staff development day was held Sept. 18.
  • The local history series continued with a House History workshop on Sept. 10.
  • Programming for both adults and children continues in the celebration of the 150th anniversary of Lewis Carroll’s Alice in Wonderland. An all-ages scavenger hunt, “The Hunt for the Hunting of the Snark,” can be followed throughout the library.
  • The circulation department issued the new eMedia cards as well as the 3 for Me Teen cards.
  • The Friday morning explorastory program returned to the Coventry Library storytime with an immediate audience response.
  • Youth Services Associate Terraya Lewis was invited to participate in Ward Shelley’s The Last Library exhibit at the SPACES Gallery. The exhibit is a walk-through installation. Terraya read stories, led a group in dance, and assisted in a craft project.
  • Planning is taking place for “On the Same Page,” a community-wide read in 2016.
  • Technology Trainer Alyse Giannotti worked with Librarian Pam Spangler in the mobile classroom to teach computer/website coding to 21 children at a Sept. 8 program at University Heights Library. This popular program will be repeated at University Heights Library and also held at Noble Neighborhood Library.
  • CWRU’s School of Dental Medicine held its annual A Toothy Affair on Sept. 27. Dental students were on hand to provide free cleanings, answer questions, and give out packets to children.

LWV observer: Anne S. McFarland.

These meeting summaries are abstracted from LWV observers’ written reports. The summaries have been edited and prepared by Anne McFarland, Charlene Morse and Maryann Barnes. To receive e-mail postings of full reports, send an e-mail to mbarnes9515@gmail.com or join through Google groups using “lwv-chuh observer reports” as a search phrase.

These reports contain member observation and selected highlights of public meetings and are not official statements of the Heights Chapter of the League of Women Voters of Greater Cleveland. This disclaimer must accompany any redistribution of these reports.

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Volume 8, Issue 12, Posted 11:46 AM, 11.18.2015