Staff Meeting Notes 3/23/16

Summary: Database Presentation, New books/material refresh, Training request reminders, Open Discussion: Party $, Planning Time

Written by: Angela Barratt

In attendance: Angela Barratt, Julia Bradley (presiding), Melinda Campbell, James Diederich, Teresa Eshelman, Cyrano Machey, Rose Siegel, Isabel Veloz.

1. Database Training: Brainfuse

• Angela and Cyrano walked us through a lively and fancy presentation of Brainfuse. 
• Here is a link to their classy color handout, and here is a link to the in-depth guide to Brainfuse that they created. You can also access these documents on our shared google drive (collierregional) by clicking on the left-hand link in drive called "Shared with me."

2. New books/material refresh

• Great job keeping everything looking fresh, especially with the NYT bestseller list
• For new books (depending on demand and popularity), try to keep only the current month and one month previous, but if you have to go further back to fill the display it's better than nothing (we talked about the fluctuation in new books and how it's impossible to predict the genres/amount that we will get)
• Please keep an eye out while roaming, particularly at the display under the TV in front
• We talked about perhaps using that space to display a specific genre, like nonfiction or romance. We decided to try romance and see how it goes. 



true romance! 

• Side note, Angela here: I just want to put in a bit on this subject from Julia's glowing email earlier this week: 
• "you should feel really proud of the respect you show our customers through presentation, neatness, organization, and awesome displays—regardless of whether you think anyone from the ELT is watching. Keep up the awesome work."

3. Training request reminders

• For training opportunities at the LDC, you need to submit a request through the training portal for funding reasons. You can read all about how to do that right here on the training portal under "Training Credits". 
• Julia will support anything you want to study to the best of her ability 
• If for any reason you need to submit training certificates, send them to Leilany before April 21; she will be taking an extended leave starting around then 

Open Discussion

4. Party $

• Questions put forth by our fearless leader: do we have 2 small parties? Or one MEGA Party? What will we eat at said party? What entertainment shall we hire? (okay, I'm editorializing a bit) 
• Apparently none of us wants to have a party because we were pretty reticent to share ideas.
• Pizza seems to be generally pleasing (personally I find even gluten-free vegetarian pizza quite pleasing) 

pizzapizzapizzapizzapizzapizzapizzapizzapizza

• Julia will start an email thread regarding pizza parlors we might use. Please chime in with any druthers. Also, if any other inspiration hits regarding types of food or other party business, please don't hold back.

5. Planning Time

• This was the opening to an ongoing discussion about planning time. 
• Melinda is doing an awesome job with the schedule, but she can only do so much without feedback from you. Feel free to let her and/or Julia know if you are finding that you don't have enough time, or if you have too much time. We talked about how some things are unpredictable, like number of library card apps or serials that come in each day. So if you need to talk about planning time in terms of weeks instead of a standard amount, that is fine. 
• Melinda said that on Friday she has scheduled people for what they asked to work on. Use the catch-up hour for whatever you need. If you finish everything you need to work on, please shelf read. 
• Melinda congratulated staff on doing such a great job with roaming in the past few weeks. 

Staff Meeting Notes 3/16/2016

Summary: Database Presentation, COH Health Care Enrollment, Volunteer Project Thank-You, Open Discussion

Written by: Julia Bradley

In attendance: Angela Barratt, Julia Bradley, Melinda Campbell, James Diederich, Teresa Eshelman, Cyrano Machey, Rose Siegel, Isabel Veloz.

1.NoveList Plus exploration (Isabel and Melinda)
 Database presentations continued this week, with Isabel and Melinda presenting on NoveList Plus. We covered tons of features of NoveList, including Readalikes, browsing categories, searching/advanced searching, linkage between HPL Enterprise catalog and NoveList, and way more. A huge thanks to Isabel & Melinda for leading us through it!

2. COH Health Care Enrollment
Open enrollment begins today and ends on April 13th. You can select or revise your plan by logging into ESS. 

Angela: There are new dental and vision plans!

Staff received an email yesterday morning from COH Benefits, where you can find information about changes in plans, copays, and networks. 

3. Volunteer Project
A huge thanks to everyone for being so welcoming towards our large group (10!) of volunteers from EDP Renewables last Friday! They had a great time volunteering with us. Our end caps are now free of tape and our shelves are less dusty.

Open Discussion
Cyrano: Yesterday there was an issue with a youth patron who had two cards: one with only her grandmother's signature and another with only her mother's. Her mother wanted information from the card that the grandmother had opened. I contacted Circ Admin for advice on what to do in this case. Julia: Will follow up with Circ Admin about policy on this. 

Isabel: Don't forget to straighten while roaming!
Thanks, Isabel, for straightening so thoroughly yesterday.

Angela: A daycare is taking a field trip to Collier this morning. We'll do a Story Time in the Kids area and then move into the Meeting Room for crafts and computer fun. Melinda will be helping out.

Melinda: 

Staff Meeting Notes 03/09/2016

Summary: Database Presentation, Volunteers, New Trainees, ACE Scholarship, COH Wellness, Straightening, New "Friends" Stamp, Claims Return, Passport Services

Written by: Isabel Veloz

In attendance: Angela Barratt, Julia Bradley (presiding), Melinda Campbell, James Diederich, Teresa Eshelman, Djuina Hammett, Cyrano Machey, Rose Siegel, Isabel Veloz, and Evelyn Mayberry. 

1.MedlinePlus exploration (Julia and James)

·         Database presentations started this week. Big thank you to Julia and James for their great presentation on MedlinePlus. 

2. Volunteer group at Collier this Friday

·         Volunteers are coming to clean our shelves this Friday. If you want to have time on the schedule to greet them, please get with Julia. 

3. More trainees at COL this week

·         We have more trainees this week, please welcome them to COL and help them out with whatever they may need.

4. HPL ACE Scholarship Program

·         There is a scholarship available to full-time and part-time employees. If you are interested and/or need more information, please let Julia know. 

5. Last chance to get COH Wellness discount

·         There is an early morning meeting for this last chance to get the COH Wellness discount that Julia is attending. Please let her know if you need more information regarding this as well. 

6. Straightening
Straightening will be a rotating duty from now on. Straightening is everybody's job; it will be put on the schedule for somebody different every two weeks. Please take it seriously and straighten the entire library when you are scheduled to do so. Also, straightening is something that should be getting done during your Roaming hours, especially something to be done for whoever has roaming during the last hour of the day as part of Closing Procedures. Feel free to split the work load by asking someone to work on the children's area while someone else works on the adult area. 

7. New "Friends of the Houston Public Library" stamp
There is a new stamp for discarded items. Please get with Teresa, Melinda, or Julia if you have any questions. DO NOT stamp books with yellow call number labels. Send them back to LMS if they are damaged. 

8. Searching for items (Melinda)
If you have a patron call or come in with a claim's return, please write down their library card number, the name on the account, and the name of the book with its bar code and leave it on Melinda's desk. Do not put it in missing right away. This way, we have time to properly look for it a few times before marking it missing. 

• Please make sure to make a note in patron's account after every shelf check.

Open Discussion

Passports:

• We need at least four people trained in order to start passport services here at COL. There is a training coming up week after next this month and another on April 19th. Please let Julia know if you are interested or if you are not interested in passport training. 
• If you are interested in being trained as a back-up, please let Julia know as well. In order to be a back-up passport agent, you only need to complete online training. 
• We are trying to figure out a way that passport services will work at COL on account of scheduling and staff needs. If you have any questions, concerns, and/or suggestions, please let Julia and Djuina know.