Some quick news regarding the Alternative Teen Services Blog and web site:
YA Lit Content Moving to Main Blog
We are in the process of phasing out the Brave & Brass Book Blog, which was a separate blog with content about teen literature. Those of you that read the Brave & Brass Book Blog are familiar with the subject matter that covers book reviews, book talks, literature perspectives, and collection development.
We found that most of the readers of our Main Blog wanted lit-themed topics, and therefore, we decided to move content from the Brave & Brass Blog to our main blog. So please note that the blog is still going to be around, but in a different format. Lit-themed content will come through our main blog instead of being separated.

Readers subscribed to the Brave & Brass Book Blog feed will continue to get content from us when it is book-related. It is hoped that the phase-out process will be finished by June 2nd. For the few of you that didn’t want to see this change, so sorry! I hope that the scroll function works well for you, so that you can get directly to the content you want to read.

Personalize your Comments with Avatars
Would you like a customized avatar to appear next to the lovely comments that you create on our blog? We recently installed a plug-in in cooperation with Gravatar that does just that! By signing-up at the gravatar web site, you can upload an avatar that will be used whenever you make comments on our Blog. The avatar is associated with the e-mail address used when leaving comments. To sign up for your avatar, go to http://www.gravatar.com. Then be sure to come back to our blog and leave a test comment so you can check out the new flair!

Teen Crafts on Flickr

Click to enlarge!

Happy Summer everyone, and congrats on getting through all those book talks and school visits.

Are you a member of the Young Adult Library Services Association? Do you have opinions on what teens’ information needs are? What are the issues that teen librarians face? What needs to be addressed so that “teen librarianship” can progress as a profession? How can we support all types of library workers that serve teens? Is YALSA helping you support teenagers from a variety of social and class backgrounds?

Did any of these questions spark an interest in you? Then you might consider running for a leadership position within YALSA. Help ensure that YALSA continues to be an effective organization for teen librarians. Or maybe you think YALSA needs some improvement? Maybe you have ideas that will shake things up a bit…

I know it can be tough to step up to the plate and take a leadership role, especially due to the amount of time and resources that would need to be set aside for carrying out assignments and projects. You will be required to attend the ALA conferences, in addition to any other meetings required of the position. But someone has to do it. And if you feel that you can accurately represent the needs of teenagers and the librarians that serve them — then why not you? Why wouldn’t you be a good candidate?

The Young Adult Library Services Association is currently gathering candidates to run for the 2009 election. Positions open include:

• President-Elect (minimum of 2 candidates; 1 elected)
• Board Directors-at-Large (minimum of 4 candidates; 2 elected)
• 2011 Michael L Printz Committee (minimum of 8 candidates; 4 elected)
• 2011 Margaret A. Edwards Committee (minimum of 6 candidates; 3 elected)
• Division Councilor (minimum of 2 candidates, 1 elected)
• William C. Morris Committee - New Non-fic award. (minimum of 8 candidates; ? elected)
  

What would you do differently if you were in charge of YALSA Printz committee? If you were a YALSA Board member, what issues would you support for the organization?

To get more information on nominating yourself or someone else for an elected position, please visit YALSA wiki:
http://wikis.ala.org/yalsa/index.php/YALSA_Election_Information

Nominations need to be in ASAP, preferably before the nominating committee meets at the ALA annual conference in June 2008.

There you will find more detailed information and links to the nomination forms.

Please repost, thanks.