TBLC News

Thanks to your votes, we have determined the winners of Ask a Librarian’s The Director’s Chair video contest!

Drum roll please…

GRAND PRIZE: Julie, a student at Seminole Ridge High School in Palm Beach County

SECOND PLACE: Karman, a homeschooled student from Lake County

THIRD PLACE: Jake, a student at Fernandina Beach High School in Nassau County

CONGRATULATIONS TO OUR WINNERS!

Click here to see the winning videos.

If you have any questions, please contact Diana Sachs-Silveira at (813) 622-8252 (ext. 234).

Vote for your favorite video in Ask a Librarian’s The Director’s Chair contest!

**Polls close Feb. 9 (11:59 p.m. EST).**  

We received many creative videos, and our judges narrowed the entries down to five finalists. Now it’s up to you to help choose the winner by voting for your favorite video. Visit www.askalibrarian.org/thedirectorschair and click on “vote” to see the top five videos and to vote for the one you think deserves to win.

We will announce the winner on Feb. 12.

Visit www.askalibrarian.org/thedirectorschair for more information.

If you have any questions, please contact Diana Sachs-Silveira at (813) 622-8252 (ext. 234).

The Director’s Chair video contest is in its final stages, and the finalists need YOUR vote!

We received many creative videos, and our judges narrowed the entries down to five finalists. Now it’s up to you to help choose the winner by voting for your favorite video. Visit www.askalibrarian.org/thedirectorschair and click on “vote” to see the top five videos and to vote for the one you think deserves to win.

**Polls will be open Jan. 27 through Feb. 9 (11:59 p.m. EST).**

We will announce the winner on Feb. 12.

Visit www.askalibrarian.org/thedirectorschair for more information.

If you have any questions, please contact Diana Sachs-Silveira at (813) 622-8252 (ext. 234).

This Friday is your students’ final chance to enter The Director’s Chair video contest. We’ve already received some very creative videos, and we can’t to see what else your high school students can do!

**Please let your students know
that they have until Jan. 18 (11:59 p.m.)
to enter their videos.**

Visit www.askalibrarian.org/thedirectorschair for more information, including prizes, official rules, YouTube submission info and release forms.

If you have any questions, please contact Diana Sachs-Silveira at (813) 622-8252 (ext. 234).

Are your high school students looking for something
to do during winter break?

Ask a Librarian’s The Director’s Chair contest is well underway, but we still need your help to promote it! With winter break quickly approaching, your students will have some free time to fill up. This is the perfect time to promote The Director’s Chair to them.

We are asking Florida high school students to flaunt their directorial skills by creating a 30-second video about Ask a Librarian and uploading it to YouTube by Jan. 18, 2008, for the chance to win some awesome prizes.

In order for The Director’s Chair to be a success, we need YOU! Please let teens in your community know about the contest. We’ve posted some information here that you are welcome to copy and paste into your own teen blog.

We also have flyers available as a PDF (here) or a JPG (here). Or feel free to post the contest logo (available here) on your website.

This is a great chance to get our students involved in Ask a Librarian. We hope you’re as excited by the contest as we are, and we thank you for promoting The Director’s Chair!

Visit www.askalibrarian.org/thedirectorschair for more information, including prizes, official rules, YouTube submission info and release forms.

Ask a Librarian kicked off The Director’s Chair, and we need your help to promote it!

We are asking Florida high school students to flaunt their directorial skills by creating a 30-second video about Ask a Librarian and uploading it to YouTube by Jan. 18, 2008, for the chance to win some awesome prizes.

In order for The Director’s Chair to be a success, we need YOU! Please let teens in your community know about the contest. Here are some suggestions:

• Put up flyers in your libraries. Flyers are available as a PDF (here) or a JPG (here).
• Post the contest logo (available here) on your website.
• Link to The Director’s Chair contest website (www.askalibrarian.org/thedirectorschair) from your website.
• Write a post on your teen blog (feel free to copy and paste the info from our blog post) or simply link to our existing post. 
• Post it on your MySpace and FaceBook pages. Visit Ask a Librarian’s MySpace page and look for The Director’s Chair banner. Simply copy the code beneath the logo and paste it into your MySpace profile for the banner to appear on your MySpace page.

This is a great chance to get our students involved in Ask a Librarian. We hope you’re as excited by the contest as we are, and we thank you for promoting The Director’s Chair!

Visit www.askalibrarian.org/thedirectorschair for more information, including prizes, official rules, YouTube submission info and release forms.

If you have questions, please contact Diana Sachs-Silveira at (813) 622-8252 (ext. 234).

On Sunday, August 18, Ask a Librarian intern Louis answered a question from a gentleman who needed genealogy books about Ohio. Louis guided the patron, who typed slowly due to a stroke, to some resources in his local library that could help him prepare to teach a class on the subject.

This might seem like a typical day and a typical question for Ask a Librarian — but it was so much more than typical. It was the 100,000th question answered through Ask a Librarian!

This is quite a landmark for the service. Since July 28, 2003, Ask a Librarian’s usage has been steadily growing. Of the 100,000 questions that we have answered, over 65,000 have been live chat sessions and over 38,000 have taken place in the past 10 months.

Congrats to everyone involved in making Ask a Librarian a success. Give yourself a high five!

Even with its traditional summer slowdown, Ask a Librarian had a busy June!

By the end of June 2006, Ask a Librarian had assisted 15,502 users so far that year. Users have increased by 47 percent with 32,751 questions so far this year! This June, AAL had 2,287 chat sessions, which was a 41 percent increase in chat sessions from June of last year.

Congratulations to everyone involved in Ask a Librarian, and keep up the great work!

Ask a Librarian’s May 2007 statistics are in, and usage continues to increase!

Ask a Librarian had 2,607 live chat sessions and 993 email sessions in May 2007. From May of last year, AAL had an increase of over 140% in live chat sessions and an increase of 38% in email, totaling an increase of almost 100% from last year’s use.

Ask a Librarian had an average of 87 reference chat sessions each day, with the typical weekend totaling at over 100 sessions. Ask a Librarian has had 21,232 live chat sessions this grant year, a 131% increase over the previous grant year.