Flood Recovery: What Communities and Individuals Should be Doing Now

WATERBURY – A number of communities have suffered significant damage in this week’s flooding.  Recovery efforts have begun and could eventually include monetary help from the federal government.

The process of obtaining funding from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) has begun, and the state of Vermont is working to get through theprocess as quickly as possible.  Local communities should not delay in making repairs or cleaning up; if Vermont qualifies for FEMA assistance, thosefunds serve to reimburse communities for at least 75% of those costs.

The process of getting FEMA assistance and what communities should be doing now:

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The National Digital Newspaper Program

Thursday, April 21, 5:00 pm
Special Collections Reading Room
Bailey/Howe Library, University of Vermont, Burlington

Deborah Thomas, Program Coordinator for the National Digital Newspaper Program (NDNP) at the Library of Congress, will talk about the effort to digitize historically significant newspapers from all over the United States and make them freely available through “Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers,” a web site hosted by the Library of Congress.

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The Importance of Libraries in Genealogical Research

In honor of National Library Week, Archives.com has put together a white paper and visual graphic about libraries’ importance to our communities and to genealogists, and some of the difficulties they have been facing during the economic downturn.

You can see their white paper and infographic here: http://www.archives.com/blog/industry-news/national-library-week-2011.html.

You may join the cause and share this post on library websites, blogs and Facebook/Twitter (shortened URL for tweets that we’ve been using: http://bit.ly/hLfkZL)! If you’d like, you can even embed the visual graphic onto your site using the code provided in our blog post.

Happy National Library Week 2011!

Jesse Willoughby
Archives.com

National Library Week – Spread the Word


Vermont Library Association, Vermont School Library Association and Vermont Department of Libraries have partnered to create a state-wide advertising campaign during National Library Week which will kick off this Sunday April 10. Three ads will appear in all the regional papers this week.  Television commercials will run on WPTZ during the Today Show, WCAX during the 6-7 am news hour, will be available to all public access channels in Vermont and are posted on the VLA YouTube Channel.

Please help spread the word about the campaign and the great services you have to offer.

  • Contact your local public access channel and ask them to make sure run the Vermont libraries PSAs that are available through the public access consortium.

**Note: The article by Chris Bohjalian will appear in the Burlington Free Press and on his blog Sunday morning. The link to his blog article will go live Sunday morning.

Thank you for your help in getting the word out.

Marti Fiske, President, Vermont Library Association

New DCF and GMBA Lists and Voting Information

Hello, all: I am pleased to announce that we now have lists for both the Dorothy Canfield Fisher Book Award (grades 4-8) and the Green Mountain Book Award (grades 9-12)for 2011-2012.

The DCF list is here: http://libraries.vermont.gov/libraries/cbec/dcf

And the GMBA list is here: http://libraries.vermont.gov/sites/libraries/files/gmba/gmbamasterlist11-12.pdf

Voting on the 2010-2011 lists:

To vote for the DCF winner, please use the online form at www.dcfaward.org. Deadline is April 15.

To vote for the GMBA winner, please use the forms here: http://libraries.vermont.gov/libraries/gmba Votes are due on Friday, May 6.

Happy reading!

Center for Cartoon Studies Scholarship

Librarians: Alert your budding cartoonists!

For the third year in a row, the Center for Cartoon Studies in White River Junction has donated a full scholarship to the Department of Libraries so a Vermont teen can attend their one week workshop, “Make Comics,” in the summer. This full scholarship, worth $850, includes the workshop, supplies, light breakfast, full lunch and evening student activities. Lodging is not included, but there is a very inexpensive hostel option at the nearby Hotel Coolidge. Any Vermont student age 16 – 19 (must be 16 years old by June 1, 2011) is eligible. The workshop will take place in White River Junction, VT July 18-22, 2011.

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Gale/Vermont Online Library Webinar Archives

The archives from the February Gale/Vermont Online Library webinars have been posted. They can be found at:

http://libraries.vermont.gov/libraries.ce/voltraining

Direct links to the individual webinars:

Vermont Online Library and Gale Resources Update:
http://www.vermont.gov/portal/media/video.php?mid=156

Job Help Tools From Vermont Online Library:
http://www.vermont.gov/portal/media/video.php?mid=154

New Vermont Online Library Databases: Foreign Languages and Job Help:
http://www.vermont.gov/portal/media/video.php?mid=155

Better World Book Offering Grants for Libraries

$75,000 in Funding Available for Library Literacy Programming
Better World Books is excited to introduce the LEAP Grants (Literacy and Education in Action Program) for Libraries. Applicants will propose a compelling literacy project in their community. It is understood that the needs and opportunities of the communities that libraries serve vary widely and are eager to review a variety of applications.

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