Thank you for reading the Alternative Teen Services Blog. Please take a few minutes to let us know about your interest in reading this blog!

http://www.polldaddy.com/s/38F3D9E7702F9350/

Thank you for your time!

Hi everyone, this is Stephanie from the Alternative Teen Services Blog. As you may have noticed, our blog posts have dwindled! The last time this thing was updated was a little more than a month ago. A handful of our regular bloggers are taking a hiatus and we need some fresh voices to step in for replacement.
Are you interested in sharing your passion, ideas, and experience of working with teens in libraries? Would you be willing to blog for librarians in need of inspiration, support, and ideas?

If so, then please get in touch by sending an e-mail to teenservices@yalibrarian.com

Thank you for your time, and thanks for reading the Alternative Teen Services Blog.

Stephanie

PS please share this with anyone that might be interested! Thanks.

 Attention Teen Librarians: Want free money for your teen tech week programming?

YALSA is giving out 20 mini grants for Teen Tech Week celebrations. Each grant is $450 in cash for a library’s TTW plans, plus $50 worth of Teen Tech Week products from ALA Graphics. All you have to do is turn your application into yalsa@ala.org by January 7…. Which is next Monday

To download the application and official rules for the Teen Tech Week mini-grants contest, visit www.ala.org/teentechweek and click on “Contests.”

It’s that easy!

Good luck with your Teen Tech Week mini-grant.

-Stephanie, 2008 Teen Tech Week Chair 

Crystal Niedzwiadek interviewed me about the Alternative Teen Services Blog for a YALSA Podcast. We talked about the technical process of running a blog, spam, censorship, and connecting with the community of teen librarians. You can listen to the podcast here:

Or download it here: http://pod-serve.com/audiofile/filename/7611/ttw_bloggers.mp3

The second half of the podcast is with Eli Neiburger and focuses on the AADL Gaming Blog, which is used to establish an online community between the teens and kids that attend gaming tournaments at Ann Arbor District Library. There is some pretty fascinating discussion going on about gaming in libraries. For more information on Gaming, teens, and libraries, I recommend listening to a gaming presentation Eli did at the 2007 gaming in libraries symposium.
http://gaming.techsource.ala.org/index.php/…

In my place of work, there is a centralized fund used to purchase teen materials for the branch libraries and those purchases are usually based on starred reviews in journals. Unfortunately, these starred books tend to be the types of materials that teens in my community are not interested in. Instead, they hunger for urban books, high-interest non-fiction, and manga. There are also requests for the best sellers that don’t necessarily get starred book reviews, such as James Patterson’s Maximum Ride series. And I also have some classic readers that are gearing up for college.

Thankfully, I have an infill budget that can be used to build the collection beyond starred booklists. Herein lies the challenge. With a modest amount of infill money, where should you start? Should the money go towards building a core collection? This can be especially pertinent if the collection is lacking core materials and balanced genres. Should it be spent on high-interest materials that will fly of the shelves? The missing college-bound classics that a handful of teens are requesting? Best sellers that aren’t stocked by the publication date because they weren’t starred in a review journal? Selection lists from the Young Adult Library Services Association? As a children’s/teen librarian with a modest budget, I must make the best of the allocated funds to provide teens with a balanced collection.

Here’s what I did to meet this challenge:

The first year I worked here, I purchased core materials for the collection. Authors such as Sharon Flake, Sharon Draper, Walter Dean Myers, and Jaqueline Woodson were missing, possibly because they were initially available but never returned. To get ideas for what makes a core collection in an urban library,I browsed book blogs on the internet, recommended reading lists on Amazon.com, and articles published by YALS and VOYA. I spent the remaining money on high-interest materials and manga. Teens in the library eagerly provided me with a list of manga series to order. And YALSA’s Quick Picks for Reluctant Readers is an excellent resource when buying high-interest materials for teens.

During year two, I have focused on acquiring urban books, which includes the Bluford High Series and the Kimani Tru Series. I’ve also run into a dilemma with the manga collection, in which most of the material acquired from year one is permanently missing. In other words, about 40% of the manga has been stolen. At this point I had to decide between purchasing new manga series that our animanga club has suggested, and reordering missing titles. I chose to acquire the new series and year three collection money may focus on missing titles.

At the end of the budget year, I plan to use YALSA’s Popular Paperbacks for Young Adults and Quick Picks for Reluctant Readers to get up to date with new high-interest materials. I usually poke around in the other YALSA selection lists too, including Great Graphic Novels for teens.

I think the key to building any collection is to have a game plan and teens should be involved in the process of developing the plan. I based the way I built the collection on the interests of teens in the community. I did surveys that asked about their favorites subjects and I also take notes from reader’s advisory interactions. That’s how I found out that urban books, high interest fic and non-fic, and manga are the materials most likely to be checked out.

With a modest budget, you can’t have the perfect teen collection. You can only build towards it. So you have to make decisions about what aspect must be focused on. I chose high-interest materials because I want the books to be read. But I balanced out that focus by purchasing core authors that teens from the inner-city would be required to read for book reports or just because their friends told them about it!

Resources

Core Collection
YALSA’s Outstanding Books for the College Bound

Urban books for Teens
Crazy Quilts Blog - 2007 list for teens of color
Crazy Quilts Blog - 2006 lists

Selection Lists
YALSA Selection List

Manga
TokyoPop
DelRay

Addendum: Readers, if you have any good resources you use for collection development, please share!

Library Review is looking for papers about web 2.0 and teens in libraries. According to the journal description, “Library Review aims to provide an international communication link between researchers, educators and library professionals in academic, public, company and other libraries by publishing papers which have been reviewed by the Editor and one or more reviewers.”

_____________________________

Special issue call for papers:  Web 2.0, teenagers and libraries

According to a recent survey of 11 to 20 year olds reported in Media Guardian (17.5.07), more than 90% of UK teenagers have used a social networking website and a third have at least four profiles on social networking websites. One-fifth claimed they ‘couldn’t live without’ social networking. It is essential that libraries which aim to engage a teenage audience acknowledge this trend and find new ways to provide services which are accessible to teenage users in the online environments where they feel most comfortable.

This special themed issue of Library Review (http://www.emeraldinsight.com/info/journals/lr/lr.jsp) will explore the current use of Web 2.0 technologies in libraries which serve teenagers, and consider how services might be developed future to better meet the needs of a teenage audience.
The issue will cover initiatives in all types of libraries serving teenagers: school, public, college, university and other information services. Contributions are welcome from researchers, library/information practitioners and other interested parties. Suggested topics include (but are not limited to):

• Involving teenagers in the design of web 2.0 services
• MySpace, Facebook and other social networking sites
• The use of blogs
• Security and safety issues
• Getting staff – and managers - onboard
• Gaming - does it have a place in libraries?
• Online reading groups
• Podcasting - library tours and other uses
• Web 2.0 approaches to information skills
• Wikis and online communities.

Articles should be between 4,000 and 6,000 words in length. Author guidelines are available at http://www.emeraldinsight.com/info/journals/lr/notes.jsp
If you are interested in submitting an article, please email sarahmcnicol@hotmail.com I am very happy to discuss ideas for contributions.
The deadline for submission of full articles is 18^th April 2008.

Alt. Teen Services received a mention in the latest issue of VOYA! Do you remember the Alternative Teen Fashion show we blogged about in the past? Well it just so happens that the Alt. Teen Fashion show, facilitated by Jenine Lillian, received VOYA’s Most Valuable Program award for Young Adults 2006! And she kindly gave credit to yalibrarian for promoting the books that jumpstarted the entire fashion ordeal.

“After Stephanie Iser, a teen librarian in Kansas City, Missouri, posted an entry on her nationally recognized blog, Alternative Teen Services (http://www.yalibrarian.com), about cool, new fashion books for teens, Lillian ordered the books for her library’s young adult collection.While visiting schools in Fayetteville, she booktalked several titles including Generation T: 101 Ways to Transform a TShirt by Megan Nicolay. When she introduced this book, sparks flew among the teens. By August, a Teen Alternative Fashion Show Planning Team of twenty teens began meeting with Lillian to brainstorm about creating an event unlike anything they had ever experienced. They set their sights on Teen Read Week in October for their performance date.”

Wow! Thanks for the mention Jenine, and it’s good to know our blog is being so inspirational to yalibrarians. But let me give credit where credit is due! Amanda Rodriguez is the brilliant mind behind the collection development posts, including the blog regarding cool new fashion books for teens.

So I have a few points to make, in no particular order:

A) Congratulations to Jenine and all the hard working teens at Fayetteville Public Library for getting Most Valuable Program of the year! That’s amazing, and we here at Alternative Teen Services think your program hands-down deserves the award.

B) The write-up in VOYA provides a lot of background information about the planning that went into the event, and tips for hosting a similar program at your own library. So read the article in full to get some tips!
http://pdfs.voya.com/VO/YA2/VOYA200710fashion_show.pdf

C) Amanda, thanks for being an awesome contributor to YALIBRARIAN.COM. Your posts have been very cutting edge, always providing interesting insight and a fresh look into teen library services. Thanks for being such a voracious reader and letting us know your opinion on new books, notifying us of the new stuff that’s worth ordering, and finally, for being such a big teen advocate as I personally know you are from working with you at the Kansas City Public Library. And thanks for inspiring the Alt. Teen Fashion Show!

The Card Catalog of Creativity Blog has a nice overview of a Teen Advisory Group Meeting in which teens painted book ends for the library. The activity allowed teens to personalize the teen collection.

Thinking about a renovation? The Indie librarian shares research on the types of furniture teens do and don’t like in their libraries. While some furniture may be cute in the children’s area if placed in the teen area the furniture would be out-of-place.

If you need to attract teens to the library, then why not build a state-of-the-arch gaming facility equipped with xbox 360s and gaming PCs? Carver’s Bay branch library in South Carolina did just that and gained more than 60 members for the teen gaming club within the first week of opening.

Tech Related

If you have logged onto Facebook recently, chances are you read the news about profiles appearing in Google search results. This may be a good time to remind teens about controlling privacy settings on public profiles.

Lit Related

The latest episode of JetSet highlights diy ‘zines. I thank twitter for the introduction to Jetset, which is a quick mashup of the weekly news in a digestible video format. The last episode included more than one story related directly to teens and the pop culture that influences them so much.

A new blog featuring urban lit reviews is looking for – reviews! For more information, visit streetfiction.org.

Teen Read Week is just about four weeks away! There is still time to register on the YALSA web site. Visit ala.org/teenread before September 17th to register.

In and Out of the Rabbit Hole

China Miéville’s Un Lun Dun is a singular phantasmagoria that nonetheless tempts comparisons to Alice in Wonderland, Narnia, and His Dark Materials. In his acknowledgments Miéville thanks Lewis Carroll, Tanith Lee, and Neil Gaiman, among other writers, clearly signifying what is to come for the reader. By not shrugging off his influences, Miéville can integrate them unselfconsciously with his own ideas and language. Miéville is a master of the switcheroo and the sneak. He thumbs his nose at conventions of the fantasy genre like councils and prophesies. And happily, he values libraries and librarians. The extreme librarian and bookaneer Margarita Staples says,

“I used to really look forward to requests for books way down in the abyss. There are risks: hunters, animals, and accidents. Twenty years ago, I was in a group looking for a book someone had requested. We were led by Ptolemy Yes…after weeks of searching we ran out of food and had to turn back…he’s out there still in the Wordhoard Abyss living off shelf-monkeys, looking and he’ll be back one day, book in his hand.”

Un Lun Dun is shelved in my library’s YA division and I think a lot of geekier older teens would love it. However, the book would be just as appropriate in any adult collection. It is irritating that a book is considered YA if it is fantasy and features teenage protagonists. Un Lun Dun’s heroines are the tall blonde Zanna and the awkward round Deeba, who both find themselves in Un London, one of many abcities including Lost Angeles, Baghdidn’t, Parisn’t. The story of the abcities is a critique of disposable culture and environmental collapse. Broken things find their way to abcities where they are repurposed as tools and weapons.

While Miéville packs his story with too many characters to remember, Un Lun Dun delights with its many inventions: Brokkenbroll, smombies, Smog, Klinneract, Wraithtown, Webminster Alley, Storyladders, the Black Windows, and MOIL (Mildly Obsolete in London.) Miéville enlivens his inventions with great illustrations that give a sense of how cinematic this novel could be.

One of Un Lun Dun’s most subversive moments occurs when Deeba is accused of terrorism by Inspector Churl. “Were you terrified, Murgatroyd? There you go girl: you’re a terrorist. You make me twitchy, and under Article Forty-one of the 2000 Terrorism Bill, that’s all I need. Time for some reasonable force, I think.” It is exciting to see a fantasy novel marketed to a teenage audience exposing corruption and the erosion of civil liberties. I only hope that readers can draw the obvious parallels to our present-day situation.

Un Lun Dun was exciting to me in a way a book hasn’t been since I was nine, reading by flashlight under the covers. It is a smashing combination of dystopian anarchism and realist hope.

Literature Themed Social Networks
A book report alternative
Teen readers may find perks in either of these programs aimed at gathering teen opinions on young adult books. First Look offers ARCs to registered teens in exchange for opinionated reviews. Creating an account with First Look will enable the user to participate on the message boards as well as grant them permission to receive arcs. If you have a library MySpace page, HarperTeen has a presence worth checking out. Just grab some code to continue promoting literature. More involved but equally rewarding, the Pulse It program created by Simon and Schuster, Inc is aimed at reading enthusiasts. Teens print a parental consent form, mail it to S&S, then create a member profile. They will be sent young adult titles to review including ARCs on a regular basis.

Shelfari* and Revish*
For teens who have book collections at home, Shelfari is the coolest place on the web to create an online bookshelf, join book discussion groups, make friends with similar genre interests, and gleefully grab some code to show off their bookshelf on MySpace or other blogs. Shelfari recently held a best review contest for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows in which the winner received a signed copy. I’m not aware of Shelfari holding many contests, but Revish is hoping to have more user-driven review of the month competitions. If they follow through this idea, Revish would be the place to suggest for the teen looking to branch out of book reports.

Teens gearing up for another year at school may also enjoy more social networks discussed on the main blog found here.

There is a lot going on in both the library world and blogosphere and sometimes it can be too much to keep up! I’ll be doing a monthly update of news, and I hope this update will help you breathe a little by giving you just enough news to get caught-up.

Teen Read Week is less that two months away, meaning that all us TeenLIBS should have a game plan in mind for supporting this national literacy initiative. There are tons of program ideas on the YALSA wiki, and many can be used for last-minute program planning.

Although the ALA Annual 2007 conference is old news, it’s worth mentioning some of the librarians that have provided blog coverage from a teen librarian perspective. Lindsey and Trisha provide an excellent overview of the conference on their blogs about special events, programs, adventures in the stacks, and personal experiences. There is also some good mentions on the YALSA blog regarding the conference, including the Zine-A-Palooza program, the Music and Media Interest Group Meeting, and the to I-Pods and Beyond Presentation.

The Gaming, Learning, and Libraries Symposium was held July 22-24 in Chicago. Beth Gallaway has provided coverage for the symposiom on the Game ON: Gaming in Libraries blog. Included in the coverage is Eli Neiburger’s guide to choosing videogames for tournament play and information about sharing your library’s videogame scores by joining a national library videogame ledger (to begin in January 2008).

Liz and Sophie over at Pop Goes the Library Blog need your help! They are writing a book and need input about using pop culture to connect with the community. If interested in helping, you can take the survey here. The book will be called Pop Goes the Library: Using Pop Culture to Connect with your Whole Community.

Lindsey Dunn recently hosted a teen Mystery theater program that received a positive response from the participating teens. The mystery kit used to conduct the program can be purchased online for around $30.00. Read more about the program and see photos on her blog, Zee Says=Film Addict + Teen Librarian.

Worthington Public Library hosted a fashion program for teens called Project Goodwill. Teens were instructed to put together a last-minute runway outfit using donated clothing from library staff. They were allowed to bring one accessory from home to complete the outfit. Visit the Worthing Public Library teen blog for more information.

Joyce Valenza shares a list of photo and image web tools on the SLJ Blog. Of special note is the graffiti text generator and the powerful online graphics editing program, Picnik. Share these web tools with your teens or use them to updgrade your Teen Library Myspace.

And now onto news from the local front, regarding our AWESOME web site! Carleen from Library Shrine will be coming back on board as an active blogger. You can look forward to her well-thought out posts in the immediate future.

The TeenLibWiki underwent a makeover so that it can operate more as an organic encyclopedia rather than a list of links to web sites. Extensive documentation has been included on how to participate, so please read up and help us build a totally awesome and free online resource for teen librarians.

And finally, I have recently received several e-mails from people wanting to contribute to the Alt. Teen Services blog. We definitely want the help, so thanks for offering it. I plan to catch-up on these e-mails sometime in mid-August, and I thank you for being so patient!

A couple of years ago I bought myself a copy of Connecting Young Adults and Libraries. As a paraprofessional serving teens, I found the book to be a good introduction to teens and libraries. It covers all the basics from teen volunteers and advisory groups to collections and services. It was only natural for me to bring up this resourceful read to a coworker who also served teens.

ME: So have you read Connecting Young Adults and Libraries? I bought a copy and it has some good tips on starting a teen advisory group.

HER: You mean the pink book?

ME: Yeah, that one!

HER: But of course, over here we call that the YA BIBLE!

So a couple of days ago when I got an e-mail about the new YA BIBLE, I felt compelled to share the announcement on this blog.  It turns out that a new edition is being published and the editors need your feedback. Please fill out an online survey by July 24th to shape what’s to come in the new book.

Read the full message below:

Subject: We need your feedback to make the 4th edition of Connecting Young Adults and Libraries the best, ever!

Hello teen librarians, LSTs, youth advocates, library school professors, grad school students, and anyone else who might have an interest in helping shape the next edition of Connecting Young Adults and Libraries, the book that Mary K. Chelton claims “has everything—clear philosophical goals for the service grounded in developmental assets; an incredible list of how-tos by authors who have been there, done that; a lively text; and a rock-solid understanding of the real kids who need us, not the fantasy kids we often confuse with them.”

If you have read or used the 1st, 2nd, or 3rd edition of our professional book, Connecting Young Adults and Libraries, we need your feedback to help make the 4th edition as comprehensive and practical as possible. We will be collecting all survey responses on Monday, July 24.

If you have a copy of any edition of Connecting Young Adults and Libraries, it might be helpful to have it in front of you as you answer these questions. It’s not necessary, just helpful. When you’re ready to begin, click on the link below to get started with the simple 10 question survey. If you’d like to leave the survey at any time, just click “Exit this survey”. Your answers will be saved.

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=eXKBV1NeIp9SQ_2bkv6lHj_2fQ_3d_3d

Thanks for your input – we appreciate it!

Michele Gorman and Tricia Suellentrop

Co-authors of Connecting Young Adults and Libraries, 3rd edition
comixlibrarian@aol.com; triciasuellentrop@gmail.com

This past week, I joined the ranks of teen librarians attending the American Library Association annual conference in Washington, DC. The majority of the conference was spent networking, participating in meetings, and attending programs such as the To I-Pods and Beyond Presentation and Video Games as a Service: Hosting Tournaments @ Your Library.

One of the empowering aspects of the Washington DC trip was the tour of Capitol Hill that I worked into my schedule before the flight home. There I began reflecting on freedom and democracy while absorbing the sight of the Lincoln and World War II memorial. My thoughts drifted to all the soldiers that have died to secure the safety, culture, and democracy of the United States. You could say these people died for our freedom and I think the best way to repay them is to get involved with making the world a better place. I like to imagine that the soldiers would be proud to know that some of us are not taking our freedom for granted and are instead actively contributing to the progress of society.

By working with teens, I think this activism translates into several things. It’s about empowering teens and providing them with programs that support their developmental needs. It’s about being a friend when a teen needs someone to talk to. And sometimes this means being the only person in your library that is a teen advocate.

Activism is also about contributing ideas to national organizations like YALSA, so that it is relevant to all types of teen librarians. One of my colleagues complained to me that YALSA isn’t relevant to them and lacks the types of resource they want. So I encouraged this friend to take action by joining YALSA and attempting to start something new or at least get involved on some level to make a difference.

But even so, we still need outlets that aren’t tied to national organizations, where we can discuss teen library services without fear of a public relations stigma or having to express our ideas within Robert’s Rule of orders. Online communities such as the listservs and blogs can in many ways provide this type of grassroots forum. I hope that in some ways Alt. Teen Services can also be that type of resource.

What does an Eclipse teen program and Jewish Culture booklist have in common?
 I’ll give a few hints:

• The item in question was recently reviewed in the latest issue of the YALS journal.  
• It changes at least once a week, if not more, with new information
• You have the authority to add to it and change it.
• It gives you access to booklists that are being updated all the time with new titles

What the Eclipse prom and Jewish culture booklist have in common, is that they are both topics explored in further detail on the TeenLibWiki. These two articles were also recently added to the wiki and/or updated within the past month.
TeenLibWiki has changed. There is more documentation, such as how to start a new page or how to upload images. 
Add your program ideas. We have created a new section just for programming ideas. Please add your best to the list and get some tips from others.  
We (still) need your help. A wiki works best when people are adding information and editing content.
Give and Take Challenge.  I challenge you! If you login to the TeenLibWiki and find at least one useful piece of information that helps you do your job as a librarian serving teens, then I challenge you to add something to the wiki that may prove useful to someone else. And if you don’t find anything useful, maybe we need your useful ideas so please add anyways =)
Some current wiki features:

Jewish Culture Booklist - a list of magazines, fiction, and non-fiction.

CD Album Covers - step-by-step on making CD Album covers

Eclipse Prom - resources for hosting an Eclipse Prom / Release Party

Urban Libraries Council recently provided an audio conference about effective youth services in our branch libraries. The featured libraries were able to spearhead an Everyone Serves Youth philosophy that shaped their environment, allowing them to provide quality services to teens. I would like to discuss a few strategies that were highlighted in the conference, and comment on the situation of librarians that lack resources for serving teens.
 

A best practice mentioned repeatedly in the presentation, was an Everyone Serves Youth Training. Key speakers argued that youth service is dependent on staff involvement from all levels. This process includes our library administrators, who essentially define our level of commitment to youth. If serving teens is not an integral part of library service, then we lack the work culture necessary to make it happen.
 

The conference presenters challenged us to examine our work culture in regards to youth services.  Are teens a high priority in the library? Is youth development written into the strategic plan? Does all staff serve youth, or is the youth librarian held responsible for all teen issues (*sigh*, as if one person can make all the difference…)
 

For some of us, these questions reveal a need for organizational change that turns youth development into a top priority. If teen services is not valued, then what can we do about it? How much difference can an entry level librarian or paraprofessional staff make in this regard?
 

When this question was brought up during the Q & A of the audio conference, it was suggested that well prepared arguments and presentations would make any reasonable manager stop and listen. Merely vocalizing dissatisfaction is not enough, and instead our efforts should be concentrated on building a case. One presenter went as far to suggest teen involvement in this case-building process, by asking teens to stand-up and speak out to the board and administrators.
 

I wish all managers were reasonable enough to listen and take action when the above strategies were used. But this would not happen in at least a handful of libraries (maybe more than we’d like to admit…)! I have met librarians that received disciplinary action at some point in their career, specifically for addressing the systemic problems that dumb down teen services. What can be done as a staff person in an environment that frowns upon organizational change?  Is there any hope?
 

I want to say YES! I want to say – one person can make a difference. And honestly, any librarian that cares and puts forth effort will positively impact teens. But as stressed in today’s ULC conference, it takes more than one person to serve youth. If you are the only person that is making an effort, then teen services in general will fail…
 

Maybe our question will lead to this: is it better to work in a functional, progressive work place where one can be effective, or to stay in a disconnected environment, knowing that by doing so at least ONE advocate will be able to help teens.