Alta: The transformation

While there are still hundreds of books to process and get on the shelves, the library itself is becoming more functional every day. It has gone from this:

To this:

Alta: hunkering down on the records transfer

There is a matter of 467 partial records imported into Infocentre from the public library to deal with.
Jan S. came down this week and we plugged away at de-processing former public library books – taking off the call numbers we don’t use in a school library, such as “J” for juvenile, since all of our [...]

Alta: A circulation desk arrives; the library begins to function

Hooray for furniture! We got our Smartboard, too, for the library and computer lessons. And CHAIRS! And, on the floor, you can see the storytime rug. It is finally coming together, furniture-wise.

Of course, what is the point of a desk if you don’t fill it with piles of books to process and catalog, and your [...]

Alta: The non-fiction collection

Sara is amazing! I only come one day a week because of my three other libraries, so she does most of the “heavy lifting.” She whipped the non-fiction section into shape.

There is a problem with fiction, though.
The problem is that the big collection ordered for the library was all non-fiction, a bid collection, and it’s [...]

Alta: Lo, and behold, shelves finally arrived

…and not a moment too soon! Actually, about a month late. Vendors have trouble getting their wares to Wyoming, it seems.
But the shelves were there, and some books were ready for them:

Alta: In the meantime, I cataloged and enjoyed the school

Which is lovely:

There are about 40 students. Here is everyone lining up for the all-school picture day (instead of taking one picture per class, the students take pictures together. Grades are combined, two at a time, and taught together.)

It is worth noting that the principal has the coolest car I’ve pretty much ever seen.

They take [...]

Alta: There were books – oh yes, there were books

Just because we didn’t have furniture, it didn’t mean we didn’t have books.
There were more than 1,000 books waiting to be cataloged and shelved (once we had shelves). It was an intimidating sight.

A sizeable order, waiting to be opened and cataloged…

Sara and I took the books out of the boxes. She began organizing them and [...]

In the beginning: The Alta library

In the beginning, there was an empty room.
It was not always empty. It used to be full of books, computers, and activity, when the public library ran a combined school and community library at the school.
Now the public library has its own bookmobile (in the school’s parking lot) and the school is creating its own [...]