Stock Your RA Pantry: Library Goodreads Updates

During the quarantine of 2020, I began a series of posts entitled, Stock Your RA Pantry. These posts address the things you can do from home to enhance your RA Services and Resources both now and going forward. And, these are all things any library worker can do, no matter what their official job title at the library happens to be.

One of my very first suggestions was to "Get Busy on Goodreads." To be fair, I have told library workers too do this for years, but most did not have the time to devote to really setting themselves up as a library. And then, people were sent home, buildings were shut down, and libraries needed a reason to pay them. Finally, libraries started allowing all staff to add to their library Goodreads pages.

You can go to the original post for detailed information on how to get started, but the key is to have any staff who are interested to get a new Goodreads account with their work email and then link them all on your Libraries page. 

This is an easy way to give your staff--  all staff from the custodial staff to the Director-- a way to serve your organization's mission. Anyone who wants, should be encourages to share their  3-5 star reads on Goodreads in a way that other staff can capture them to use to make suggestions or patrons can see to enhance their socially distant browsing experience. 

I have be actively sharing one of my success stories in all of my presentations-- Des Moines Public Library-- who started a robust RA Service from scratch during the pandemic, across multiple buildings, involving staff who didn't work together, for in some cases, hadn't ever met. Here is their "DMPL Book Chat" Good reads page.

Recently, someone asked me for more success stories of libraries who stock their RA Pantry with reviews and info on Goodreads. If you use this link you can get a full list.

Or, just use the search bar and type in "public library." It defaults to a title search, but you  can click on "groups" and you will see libraries.

Every library uses the page differently, but the key is to attach your staff and their work shelves to the account so you have access to everyone's reading in one place. Allow your patrons to join and they can be part of your "community" book shelf too.

Finally, as we all begin to open up more over the next few months, do not forget about your virtual services, especially Goodreads. Any "normal" we return to MUST continue to include virtual RA options going forward. We cannot go back to saying it is not possible because under the hardest of circumstances, we proved it was. 

For more Stock Your RA Pantry posts, click here.

Reminder: Stock Your RA Pantry

 Now that most libraries are stepping back their service in some way, I wanted to remind you all of my "Stock Your RA Pantry" series of things you can do to beef up your virtual RA Services.

The page is replicated below, but you can always find it in the right gutter, just above my book's cover. 

After Thanksgiving I will begin adding to it again. 

Remember if you need or want training for your staff, you can go here to see my recent presentations and current pricing structure. And as always, just click on my logo from any page to access my contact information.  

Stock Your RA Pantry Archive

During the quarantine of 2020, I began a series of posts entitled, Stock Your RA Pantry. These posts address the things you can do from home to enhance your RA Services and Resources both now and going forward. And, these are all things any library worker can do, no matter what their official job at the library happens to be.

Below is the list of specific posts in chronological order, however you can also use the tag "RA Pantry" at anytime to pull them all up in reverse chronological order.

• LJ, Booklist, and PW Free Access Means Free CE [March 23, 2020]
• Get Busy on Goodreads [March 24, 2020]
• Make or Update Your Old Book Lists and Share Them Here [March 27, 2020]
• Collect Staff Quarantine Reads [March 30, 2020]
• Quick Video Book Talks and the [Unintended] Benefits of Highlighting Staff [April 21, 2020]
• Have an Honest Conversation Around the Question, "Why Read Diversely?" [May 14, 2020]
• RA 101 from LibraryReads [August 26, 2020]

Stock Your RA Pantry: RA 101 from LibraryReads

I am back with Stock Your RA Pantry, a series of posts that address the things you can do anywhere to enhance your RA Services and Resources both now and going forward. And, these are all things any library worker can do, no matter what their official job at the library happens to be.

Today I have LibraryReads' new Readers' Advisory 101 YouTube training video to pass on.

75 minutes that covers the basic essentials of RA with ready to use examples, in 6 parts:

- Appeal (presented by Stephen Sposato) - RA Conversations (Polli Kenn) - Handselling/Book Talking (Andrienne Cruz) - Merchandising (Gregg Winsor) - How to Read a Book in 5 Minutes (Stephanie Anderson) - Keeping Up with Books (Michael Santangelo) - Book Clubs (Kelly Currie)

Click here to view.

Everyone can learn from this, even the more experienced among you. I especially like hearing examples and book talks from others, both to spice up my go-to suggestions and to see different styles of RA Service illustrated in front of me-- in this case 6 different styles.

Stock Your RA Pantry: Have an Honest Conversation Around the Question, "Why Read Diversely?"

I am back with Stock Your RA Pantry, a series of posts that address the things you can do from home to enhance your RA Services and Resources both now and going forward. And, these are all things any library worker can do, no matter what their official job at the library happens to be.

In my popular "#OwnVoices for All Readers: Incorporating EDI Values Into RA Service" program, I have a link to the Book Riot 5 part series entitled, "Why Read Diversely?" However, I don't usually  have more time during these programs than to say, "Go read that later." It is the nature of my job, that I am hired to spend a mere 60 minutes on a complex topic, so I do the best I can and provide more links so those who want to take a deeper dive.

And yet, now we have a little more training time, which is why I started this "Stock Your RA Pantry" series in the first place. Today, I want to explain a little more about this 5 part series and how you can use it to have a conversation among your staff because this series not only features POC book professionals discussing why reading diversely is important, but they also provide discussion questions, honestly tackling some of the most uncomfortable questions at the heart of this conversation, and they do it in a respectful and direct manner.

Here is a list of just some of the questions they address in the series:

• Where can I go to find authors from diverse backgrounds?
• Isn’t this publishing’s problem?
• Who counts as a “POC”? For example, does someone from Spain count? Or someone who is Jewish? And what’s up with the term “POC” anyway?
• What about other kinds of diversity? Isn’t reading diversely important in terms of politics, religion, and where an author is from, as well as race?
• What about books written by white people that are about POC? Do those “count”? And as an author, what if I’m uncomfortable writing a character who is a POC?
• How can I, as a non-POC person, relate to a story by/about a POC?
• Why does everything have to be political?
• So what’s a “good” percentage to aim for? And isn’t that just filling a quota?
• Am I a racist if I just don’t care?
• Why are diverse books specifically important in children’s literature?
• Isn’t it enough to have at least one PoC character?
• Why is it important to have PoC characters in stories that are about more than just their racial background?

As a team, either in departments or as a whole library [or even better, creating teams across departments and job levels to break into smaller group discussions so you can have a cross section of staff working on these issues together], you can read each part, the questions they pose, and the answers they provide, and then turn each part of the series into  a discussion where staff can share their thoughts, concerns, solutions, etc.... about what they read. Even the most "white" staff will have heard the point of view of people of color in this conversation simply by reading the articles.

The key is that this series is the jumping off point you need to have these conversations at your library. You don't need to hire a fancy EDI consultant to get the discussion going. Now, as you work  through an EDI focused program at your library, there will be a time when you might need professional help, but you do not need that to get the conversation started.

Unfortunately, I am seeing some libraries push back their equity, diversity, and inclusion training and the goals they have set because of the pandemic. However, I would argue that now it is even more imperative that we push EDI to the forefront. You could use these articles and questions to have an online discussion board conversation or to make them a topic at department meetings. These are conversations that every single staff member can and should participate in. This is training that is inexpensive and useful. This is an activity that should be happening everywhere.

And let's remember the importance of  including everyone on staff, not only because every level of staff, from the janitor to the director, make up your organization, but also because the hard truth is that support staff at a library are made up of more diverse people than the 88% white ladies that make up professional librarians [myself included]. To not include all staff is to ignore the entire point of having a discussion centered around equity, diversity, and inclusion.

Click here to access part 1 and then follow the links to read the entire series. In fact, please return to part 1 after you finish each part because only Part 1 has the direct links to all 5 parts [at the end of the post]

For more posts in the "Stock Your RA Pantry" series, click here.

Stock Your RA Pantry: Quick Video Book Talks and the [Unintended] Benefits of Highlighting Staff

I am back with Stock Your RA Pantry, a series of posts that address the things you can do from home to enhance your RA Services and Resources both now and going forward. And, these are all things any library worker can do, no matter what their official job at the library happens to be.

I have heard from a few libraries that you are using these posts to get your staff motivated to provide RA Service more easily in a virtual environment. In fact, a few have already begun to take my previous advice a step further, and have begun collecting videos of their staff talking about a book they love.

This is not as hard to do as you may think, and in fact, many library workers may be more comfortable speaking about a book they love rather than writing about it, as these posts have been more focused on.

And anyone on staff can do this. Again, we don't want to limit who on staff can help with RA ever, but especially right now. When we honor the different ways our staff feel most comfortable sharing their own good reads, we are also honoring the different ways our patrons may prefer to take in information.

So considering allowing staff to record themselves talking about books they have enjoyed, on their phone or home computer. 2-3 minutes is a good length. If they do not have the book with them, they can show a printout or online image of the cover. Encourage them to talk about WHY they enjoy the book, not what it is about. 

You should create a shared Google drive where staff can upload the video from their device. This will make it easier for you to upload it to your YourTube channel. In the comments, you can add links to digital copies of the title and even readalikes. Make it as easy as possible for staff and have your more official RA team do the uploading and annotating parts.

Once the video is on YouTube you can easily share it with patrons throughout a variety of platforms.

And, here's the "stock your pantry" part of the post, these don't go away when our "stay at home" orders end. If you can stock up and build a great playlist of staff suggestion videos, by encouraging all staff to help, they will be there to help you going forward. The videos themselves will be there in perpetuity. You can use them in your RA work in the future, to make suggestions, to build displays, to start RA conversations, and more. They will be an outpost on the interwebs where new patrons may find you. 

Working together you can make many more videos than just you, the staff member reading this, can do alone. Also with more voices, you also get a more varied range of title suggestions, thus reaching a wider audience of patrons looking for a good read. And, you might find a few staff members from unlikely corners of the organization who end up catching the booktalking bug-- a condition that can lead you to becoming the "Friendliest Library in Town."

But these videos also serve as a way to merchandise your staff. Show them all off, even those who work behind the scenes. Do not underestimate how much this will help you in your efforts to keep everyone employed. Your staff are your greatest asset. We know that, but our patrons do not.

I am hearing from a lot of libraries where the community and leadership are laying off library staff because the building is closed. Yes our buildings are closed, but the library itself is open. That is because the library IS its staff and the work they do. But we have always done a terrible job communicating this key fact to our patrons and communities, and now, we are paying the price of focusing on our place as a community space. We have allowed our patrons to lose sight of the fact that the library is still functioning when the physical space is closed. 

Show your community how great your staff is, even those many may think have "nothing to do" with the building closed. Of course, I know these staff have projects and jobs, many of which are going to help the organization more toward a better future, but the public can't understand that.

Seeing staff members, as many as possible, sharing a good read, will go a long way toward showing your community that the library more than the building. It will show your community the importance of the people who fill that building that they miss. Those people who are the library.

Here is an example of a library who has taken the quarantine leap into the world of video book talking. I wanted to highlight a library who did NOT do this before our current situation to show you how you don't need to have access to any special equipment or training in order to begin.

Just give it a try. And click here for more ideas on the Stock Your RA Pantry Archive page.

Stock Your RA Pantry: Collect Staff Quarantine Reads

I am back with Stock Your RA Pantry, a series of posts that address the things you can do from home to enhance your RA Services and Resources both now and going forward. And, these are all things any library worker can do, no matter what their official job at the library happens to be.

Today, I want to take advantage the increased organizational communication that is happening these days. In fact, let's stray off topic a bit and address this one remarkable and wonderful outcome of social distancing. From my personal experience with my library and from what I am hearing from colleagues all over the country, library staff as a whole are now communicating with each other better than ever before.

Library departments tend to function like silos. Which each department doing their own thing. When I come in to do full staff training, one of my biggest goals is to use the shared staff love of books and reading to bring everyone together. I call my company RA for All not only because I think anyone can participate in RA Service from any position in the library, but also because it is something that can bring everyone together. Everyone on staff has a deep connections to books. Seriously, because if they didn't they would work somewhere else for more money.

Communication across all staff is a failing at most public libraries in America. Well, it was until now. I am hearing so many happy reports of staff working together like never before. Meeting virtually, using communication tools like Slack [tools some administrators couldn't get people to use previously], and simply working together across departments to see how they can all use their skills to help all of the patrons as one united front-- not as separate silos working in a vacuum.

This is so heartening and I hope after we are "back to normal" that everyone keeps this positive, whole library communication going.

Time will tell, but for now, since staff are communicating I want you, as one of the RA people at your library to start gathering a staff quarantine "reading" list. [Note: I am using "reading" to mean every format you circulate for leisure items.]

Use whatever commutation platform is woking for your library and start a thread where you ask staff to share what they are reading. Why did they pick that book? Why was it a good read at this time. And most importantly, how did they access it? Include things people are watching and listening to also. If you circulate video games, include those too. Everything they are filling their downtime with.

On your websites, make a list of what you staff is using to pass their time, as long as it is something you currently circulate or possibly will. Include things from streaming services too, especially if you circulate onus and they can access these things after you are back open again. Don't separate the list by formats. Include it all in one place. In other words, don't get back to siloing the information by departments. Resist the urge.

This is a wonderful activity to create a sense of everyone being in this together-- both among staff and between staff and the public. I would even try to encourage patrons to interact and add their own quarantine "reads" too. Post on social media or enable the comments on your websites.

Then staff and patrons can try out the recommendations of others and maybe even engage in virtual conversations about the items they are enjoying.

The more voices you include the more inclusive and diverse the lists will be. The more voices you include, the more varied the options. This will be a great way for all staff to share their interests and engage each other in conversation. People who barely interacted before may find they have something in common.

This activity will also allow you to see the preferences of your entire staff in one place. You can see who has interests that you didn't know about. Those people can then be approached to do a bit more. Maybe they can make watch alike or readalike lists. Or what about asking them to prepare a "boot camp" for the rest of the staff on their specialty? You can work with them to figure out how they want to share their knowledge with everyone else. A list, a video, audio file, slide show....whatever that staff member wants to do. You could use this time to gather the different voices from people, get staff for whom it is harder to find work from home activities involved, and create content in varied formats to share with your patrons.

Remember, you staff will be more comfortable sharing their knowledge in different ways-- verbally, written, visually, etc.... and this is great because your patrons will each prefer to take in information in different ways.  We all do. Let's celebrate and honor that and create useful and helpful content in the process.

They are many applications for the future use of the information you gather by asking your staff to share their quarantine leisure options with each other [and patrons], but immediately this activity will bring everyone closer together, and it just might convince them to keep communicating as well when this is all over.

Click here for all of my RA Pantry posts on the Stock Your RA Pantry Archive page.

Stock Your RA Pantry: Make [or Update] Your Old Book Lists and Share Them Here

After a few days of other news, I am back with Stock Your RA Pantry, a series of posts that address the things you can do from home to enhance your RA Services and Resources both now and going forward. And, these are all things any library worker can do, no matter what their official job at the library happens to be.

All of these posts will use the label, "RA pantry," and will be gathered together on an archive page [eventually].

Today I want to address all of those book lists you have made, as a library, and posted on your websites but never updated. We make these lists once and then keep using them, forever. NO judgment here; we all do it. 

Not only are the titles old but I would guess that they are probably overwhelmingly white, male, able bodied, and heteronormative. Take a moment and go look. I can wait.....

Now is the time to go through the lists you already have on your websites and update them. Are the topics still useful? If not, get rid of them. If they are useful, when is the last time you updated them?

Online lists can be one of your best tools to help readers either in person or online. Why? First, they are easy to access anywhere. Second, the topics can be as general or specific as you want; you get to create them however you want. Base the topics on patron requests, your personal interests, local topics, or current trends-- whatever, you decide. But the very best thing about online lists is that ANY STAFF MEMBER CAN CREATE ONE!

For example, you don't have to work in the children's department to come up with a list of fun read-alouds with 4 years olds. Nor do you have to work with adults to create a list of swoon worthy romance. In fact, online lists are one of the best ways to allow all staff to participate in your service to leisure readers. It is also the best way to ensure a variety of voices are included in the book suggestion process. 

Now obviously, not every staff member is trained in book list creation, but that doesn't mean that you, someone who does work in RA regularly, cannot solicit ideas and lists from them and then use NoveList summaries and appeal terms [or another resource] to create quick annotations [as long as you say, annotations from NoveList you can "borrow" their words].

Once you have a stock pile of up to date and inclusive lists, they can be used by any staff member, from any desk to any help reader AND they can be used by readers from home to find their next good read.

Now here are some guidelines to creating the best lists:

• Assess what you have; identify what can go vs what needs an update. Don't keep lists that are no longer relevant just to have a certain number of lists stockpiled.
• The lists you are updating should contain titles between 2-5 years old. That is the sweet spot where you know the book is still relevant but your patrons have probably forgotten about it, meaning you look the most awesome for suggesting it. Also, it is more likely to be on the shelf.  Do not include brand new titles. You can use those new and popular titles as the hook though, such as Read a Likes for The Nickel Boys.
• Every list needs a diversity audit. You should be aiming for all lists to be at least 50-50 men to women and 30% diverse voices. If you cannot make the list at least that EDI compliant, I think it is because you are not trying hard enough, not because it is impossible. But, I am telling you now in no uncertain terms, if you cannot hit this bare minimum requirement, do not post that list! Here is my inclusive suggestions for fans of David Baldacci post to inspire you to work harder. Feel free to use it on your websites. 
• Farm out the lists you want to update to any and all staff who want to help. Send out an all staff email. Ask people [no matter their job title] if they want to update a list. Maybe offer a quick zoom meeting training on how to use NoveList or other resources to all interested staff in order to show them how to do it. Or just send out the ask and see what you get back; contact those who want help specifically.
• Ask people for their ideas on list topics. Encourage all staff to contribute a new idea, a new lists. This is our chance to really expand the breadth of our offerings and to identify hidden areas of expertise and interest among our staff. Maybe they don't feel comfortable creating a list, but they have an excellent idea for one.
• Create a shared Google Sheet for all staff to access with a list of your lists, when each was last updated, and by whom. Keep a different tab for new lists in progress or ideas for lists so people can signup to help. You need a way to know what you have and when it was last updated so you can not undo all the good work you do now by going back to ignoring it again.

This is an excellent opportunity to both stock your RA panty AND get more staff involved in helping all patrons with your brand-- books. Do not underestimate the team building mojo that will blossom from a project like this. Everyone working alone but on a topic they are excited about, as a way to work together, to help everyone-- staff and patrons-- will foster a sense of community and team, a feeling that is much harder to foster when we are all working in the same building but obsessed about our own projects and deadlines.

If you need some ideas on well constructed, updated lists take a look at two libraries in my area who are doing this well: Indian Prairie Public Library [Darien, IL] and Skokie Public Library.

I would like to end today's post with all of you. If your library has online book lists that you want to share, please leave a comment. We can turn this one post into its own stocked RA pantry. 

Click here for all of my RA Pantry posts. While this will be a very regular series during these days of quarantine, I do plan to keep this going as a semi-regular series in the future, much like my Call to Action posts.

Stock Your RA Pantry: Get Busy on Goodreads

Every day this week I am going to have a post in a new series I am calling: Stock Your RA Pantry. All of these posts will use the label, "RA pantry," so that they can be gathered together. Later this week I will start a new page to gather them all, but for now, I just want to get this going.

Today I have something every single one of you should have already been doing, but now you have no excuse not to. 

Get a work Goodreads account and start entering titles.

Many of you have personal Goodreads and if you want to use that for work too, that's fine, but I would say set up a new account with your work email address. You want to use this shelf to only promote books to their best reader. This is not where you would go to chat with friends about books, give bad reviews, etc...

Now spend some of that work from home time adding books you have already read. Old favorites, recent loves, whatever you want. Just start adding content. Start with just titles and ratings. And just cut and paste NoveList appeal terms [with a statement that they are from NoveList] to get started. You don't need to write a trillion reviews ASAP. A little each day. But do it now because you finally. have some time. 

Here's the thing, every single staff member can be doing this. From pages to maintenance staff to the Director. Everyone! I talk about this in my general all staff training programs. In fact, this is where I begin, by reminding all staff who work in a library that your brand is books. The public expects everyone who works in a library to have a connection to books. The public thinks everyone who works in a library is a librarians. The public wants to know what you are reading.

We need to exploit this and couple it with the fact that we wish we had more time to talk about books and reading. We wish we could suggest books to readers more often. We wish we had time to share book recs with our fellow staff members.

Guess what, we can do this on Goodreads because now we do have more time. We always could. I go into libraries and say this all the time. Everyone should get a Goodreads shelf and the library should link them into a group. Staff can share what they are reading, rate the titles, provide appeal terms and short comments about why it is a  "good read." 

As a Trustee for a public library I know we are working with managers to figure out how to have meaningful work from home for clerical staff. Not because we are jerks and want them to justify being paid while stuck at home, rather because we don't want them to lose their connection to the team, the the organization, and to the community. This is a difficult time emotionally, especially for our frontline staff who are missing their regulars, who want to be doing something to help but don't know how. Creating Goodreads shelves and stocking them, is a wonderful way for staff to contribute to the library's mission no matter their job title. Feeling useful is important. Busy work is not useful, but creating a database of staff reviews and suggestions is one of the most useful things you can do together, now. Heck, I wanted you to do it before now, but I'll take now. And once you have started it, keeping up is much easier going forward. 

Exactly who should link up the shelves and how is something that your library has to figure out. Those logistics and conversations should be started now though. Figure out how to get your administration talking about this. Encourage all staff to use their work from home time to start a shelf and begin filling it up. This is meaningful work that every single staff member can do. How you will link it for staff and the public to access can come later.

Not only does this activity help you keep track of your personal reading,  but also, the compound interest of everyone doing it means that every staff member [and if you link everyone into a group as the "blank" public library staff, every patron too] has access to everyone's reviews.

Think about how much easier it is to suggest books to readers when you have reviews and comments compiled by all of the library staff. Think about how much more helpful you can be if you could easily, with a few clicks, draw on the expertise of staff from throughout your organization, who will all have a variety of interests, way more varied than relying on just yourself for your specific department staff. 

This is a very literally take on stocking the RA pantry because you are literally stocking the virtual shelves with book suggestions-- varied book suggestions, from across the leisure reading landscape. You can use the combined efforts of all of your staff to help readers online and when they come to the desk. This becomes your local book recommendation search engine. [Bonus, tell staff that if they give a book 5 stars it means that book is eligible to be on the overall "Staff Favs" display [in house and online]. Then sit back and watch how much easier creating "Staff Favorites" lists and displays get from now on, simply because you asked everyone to participate.]

Now take your imagination one step further. Imagine patrons encountering the library staff's group shelves. Because Goodreads is where your patrons go to get book recommendations, from friends and strangers, but not generally form their local library. This makes me sad and angry. We need to be there too, for the public to encounter as they use the site to identify their next good read. We are the experts and yet, we are always running to Facebook, Instagram, or Twitter to suggest books to readers. We should instead double down on our efforts to be visible and available on Goodreads, for them to stumble over when they need us, in the place they went explicitly looking for a reading suggestion.

Use this time to get your own work shelf started. Add reviews and rating. Please only books for which you can say positive things. This work shelf is for suggesting books to their best readers, not for you to criticize. You are creating a resource here. A database of reviews that everyone can use to help readers. Who would most enjoy the book? Ask yourself that and share that answer. That's how this because a useful resource. 

You are also creating a team building experience where staff who don't normally interact with leisure readers can help with one of the library's missions. Don't underestimate how good this is for morale. I have seen it work wonders across library staffs big and small.

Also staff can shelve and review books that they normally wouldn't get to talk about in the regular line of work. In my travels around the country, when I bring this idea of staff Goodreads shelves up, I always do an informal poll. I ask the staff assembled, "Who works in Youth Services?" Hands go up. I then ask, "How many of you in YS love steamy romances?" At least one hand [if not more] goes up. EVERY. SINGLE. TIME.

People are always surprised. Why? They are adults and don't only read kids books. I mean even I don't only read horror. Well because YS staff cannot talk about steamy romances at the children's desk, no one hears then talking about those titles, but that doesn't mean they aren't reading them and loving them. If they had a staff Goodreads page, they could post their favorite romances and the staff helping romance readers would have access to useful RA information from one fan to pass on to another fan.

That is just but one example of how getting busy on Goodreads now can help your organization for years to come.

So get busy on Goodreads. Start your shelf and then communicate with your supervisor about this idea. Move it up the chain. Keep stocking your shelf while you wait. Share this post on your work Slack channels or however you are communicating virtually. Spread this idea. It will be a fun quarantine activity AND it will help your organization going forward, both in keeping a sense of teamwork going from afar AND in helping patrons. 

Click here for all of my RA Pantry posts. While this will be a very regular series during these days of quarantine, I do plan to keep this going as a semi-regular series in the future, much like my Call to Action posts.

Stock Your RA Pantry: LJ, Booklist, and PW Free Access Means Free CE

Every day this week I am going to have a post in a new series I am calling: Stock Your RA Pantry. All of these posts will use the label, "RA pantry," so that they can be gathered together. Later this week I will start a new page to gather them all, but for now, I just want to get this going.

Stock Your RA Pantry means that these are posts about how to give yourself a leg up for when we get back to normal, by doing some work now. I will be providing ideas and insight into how you can use the resources we have coupled with some extra time, the time we never have when we are also helping patrons, to give ourselves a stockpile of knowledge, resources, and information that we can immediately draw upon when we are back to public service.

Today's post is about something very familiar. So much is different but a few things can go on without much adjustment, like our regular journal reading.

Whether you are someone who orders items for your library or not, there is reason to be excited that you can get access to all the major journals online for free right now.

First, let's begin with the links on how you access them, and then I will write about why you should care, especially if you are NOT someone who orders for your collections [which is probably more of my readers than not].

Use these links to access the journals for free; both their online content that was previously behind a paywall and full digitized print issues:

• Booklist: Just go to the website and everything is available without a login
• Library Journal: Go to this page for the FREE ACCESS login info
• Publishers Weekly: Full info here and they have an app if you prefer that

Now, if you do collection development this access and its use is obvious. You can continue as you normally would reading the reviews and placing orders. However, I want to make sure everyone who reads this blog understands that there is something here for them too.

All three of these journals, but especially Booklist and Library Journal are also a great resource for you to keep yourself in the know when it comes to helping leisure readers.

A great place to start is with reading the reviews. Many of you might not have had the print issues circulate your way in the course of your jobs, but now, they can come right to your computer screen. Reading reviews, even if you never order items for a collection is an excellent way to stay in the know when it comes to current releases, trends, and readalike options. 

Reading reviews allows you to think about what type of reader you would give the book to, exposes you to more authors and titles than you could ever read on your own, and gives you a sense of the broader landscape of what is coming out at the moment. It is also much easier to spot trends when you have a broader scope to look through. You will never read all the books, but you CAN read the reviews of quite a few of them. When I taught the RA class at the MSLIS program, I had a lecture on using reviews as a resource to help readers that I gave to every student each semester. I still hear back from former students that it was one of the most useful things I taught them.

After getting caught up with reviews of upcoming titles, you can move on to coverage of the genres. This is the best time to get yourself in genre shape. Begin with those genres with which you are least comfortable.  Do a search on a genre and read the articles and lists that have been recently written about them. Library Journal does genre overviews regularly and Booklist has a spotlight on at least 1 genre or format in every issue, meaning once a year they get through just about everything. 

Moving on, these two journals both offer free webinars on a variety of topics. Click here for Booklist access and here for Library Journal [under each category you can choose upcoming or past].

Finally, stay connected with all of the news in the entirety of the book world by checking in with all three each day. The books are still coming out, conversations about books are still happening, and when we do finally all get back to our libraries we are going to be swamped with work. Use this time to catch up on you personal backlog of knowledge. Get yourself in the best shape of your life when it comes to your knowledge about the book world, especially when it comes to the current state of the genres.

Click here for all of my RA Pantry posts. While this will be a very regular series during these days of quarantine, I do plan to keep this going as a semi-regular series in the future, much like my Call to Action posts.