The daily life of a Middle School Library Media Assistant.

Thursday, May 31, 2012

Rows

Lots more packing today, I nearly have another whole row. All the metal shelves are now packed (except for a few stragglers) and started to take a row from the world languages/math shelves so I could turn the other rows so they don't project over the end of the shelf. Getting things about done back there, only about 11 working days to go until we're out of there.

Wednesday, May 30, 2012

More books...

Starting to see cart loads come in from teachers, had three cartfuls come in I checked in and put away. A box of surplus books came in from a teacher's room she had culled them from. Packed up more books. Had a student bring in a replacement book and he had purchased a paperback edition of just the first half of the book! So we went through his list and I gave him all the correct ISBN numbers so he'll be sure to get the right books to replace the ones that got stolen. He also wants to donate his novels to replace the two novels he owes us, so we'll see what Mrs. H says. I worked on our book list in Trac-it. We have several catagories of subjects that deal with World Languages, so I had to retag them all to World Languages and it looks a whole lot better. Processed in three magazines for us and two for teachers.

Come on Down

Tuesday the 29th - More books coming back today - processed in 4 magazines for the library. Packed up more teacher resources and got almost done with the first set of shelves. Put away books as well.

Friday, May 25, 2012

Visitors!

A cheery "Mrs. Willer, you have visitors!" rings out from Mrs. H and yes! My son and daughter-in-law and two adorable granddaughters come across the library! I'm so glad they came to visit :D I went around to a couple of places with them and showed my oldest granddaughter how many books we had in the back! We had fun! Other than that, I packed up 24 boxes of teacher materials today and processed in a magazine, checked in and out some books and am ready for Memorial Day weekend!

Thursday, May 24, 2012

Evacuated

Today after the assembly, we had a small explosion in one of the trash cans on campus. To be sure there were no others, our principal decided to go ahead and close school for the rest of the day while they swept the building and grounds. We spent quite a bit of time out at the football stadium while they made decisions. After the students were gone, they told staff that they were reasonably certain that we would be safe here, but anyone that felt they needed to could go and work at home. I stayed and packed up our teacher materials. 16 boxes are all packed and I cleared off two sections of shelving on the metal movable shelves they are on. 

Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Like a Squirrel

I hoarded today. All the books on top of our depository are now all safely bedded down for the summer. Didn't have to give any away though I still shifted some shelves today. I have snuck those books into cubbies and crannies and they may have to come out next fall, but for today, I'm rather pleased with my squirrelyness! I hope I can hunt them down in the fall and they won't go to seed! (Since some of them are horticulture books, it may just happen!) Cleaned off the top of the shelves so that all the empty boxes are on one shelftop now and just a few Baker and Taylor boxes on another. Got all the Life magazines down and a bunch of magazine holders out for teachers to take if they choose (though I did keep some for us). Processed in six magazines for us and two for teachers this morning too! Called a mom to say that no, the book they had paid for is still missing, but if it shows up they will get a refund. Got all the yearbooks put away and bedded down for the summer as well (except for four that I'm plundering to get two good ones out of the four cut up ones.).

Tuesday, May 22, 2012

Shift

Sometimes you just know you shouldn't ask! I asked the math head if she still wanted to keep 249 Analysis books and she said 'sure!' so now I have to find room for them all! So I spent the day shifting over the FuncStatTrig books, then all the Foundations of Algebra books and relabeling shelves - which they all needed anyway, so hopefully tomorrow I'll shift the Calculus then have room for the Analysis. I already made room for the spanish version of the Foundations books. I had some of them on top of the shelves and everything on top needs to go for the bond projects this summer. Got some boxes to start packing up teacher resources too!

Monday, May 21, 2012

999

Well, or at least very close to that. Mrs. H decided to get rid of all the old 2010 and 2011 magazines so we don't have to pack them for the summer, so I withdrew 999 (+/-) magazines out of Insignia today! Whew! Got done at the very last of the day and sent an email to teachers to come and pick them up, or they will get recycled in a week. This will give them a chance to get magazines for their rooms. We will still keep the 2012 issues and rebuild!

Friday, May 18, 2012

Inventory

Today I pretty much finished up working on the inventory we did during the AP testing. I checked over the sheets. Found a few errors like, a Prentice Hall Literature Gold was actually tagged as a Platinum edition! Straightened up the stacks and had to label some stacks that I'd never done before and reconfigured some others since we had new books added to some sets. A good day and a piece of cake from leftovers from the meeting the night before!

Thursday, May 17, 2012

Cleaning Up

Spent most of today cleaning up the back from the stuff we had back there during AP testing. Lots of notes laying around that got taken care of. We had another school request Brave New World a month ago, so I asked the teacher to return copies. None have really come in, so I looked at his schedule and saw that the class that was using it was just about done for the day, so I raced down there and knocked on the door and pleaded for five more copies so the school could get them in, and voila! I walked away with five copies! I called immediately and the textbook librarian over there actually drove over to pick them up. I was so happy that we finally got that together for them. It had been crazy with AP testing going on. Had one of our aides look for all the shelving we have scattered all over the back and he piled them up for us. Processed in a bunch of magazines and got them out. Checked in three class sets of books today so I hope our 'books out' numbers are going to start heading down! Worked on the inventory sheets that Mrs. M worked on and listed books that were supposed to be in as 'lost.' Still have a lot to do. Mrs. H also decided to get the old magazines out the door instead of keeping them since they will all have to be packed, so with the table now all clean, I can start withdrawing all the 2010 and 2011 copies and put them out for teachers to use in their classes. We hardly ever use the old copies, so it is a good call.

Wednesday, May 16, 2012

Proctoring

Today Mrs. H called and asked if I could come in a little later and finish up proctoring an AP test since she had to leave early, so I did. Worked in the library for a little bit since we were open. I checked our Professional Library from the books we pulled on Monday and cleared that whole subject out of Trac-it. Checked in books and had to reorganize a shelf since a teacher that usually keeps her class set turned them in! But I finally made them all get in the space since there was no where to go forward or back. Pulled the yearbooks that were good for the archive set in the back. Got a lot of them and then looked at the ones I had doubles of to see if one that had a bad page, maybe the other had a good page and I could flip the page over to make a whole good one. Processed in about four teacher magazines and four for us. Boxed up more surplus books. I had about 15 minutes of proctoring I got to do when Mrs. H left. I got to tell them they had 10 minutes left and then collect the tests and turn them in. It went really well. I've never done it before and the importance of the tests and what it means to the students made it amazing to be there.

Personal Day

Today was a day off. My son, his lovely wife and two granddaughters arrived from Italy. He's been stationed in the army there for three years. We hadn't yet held our newest granddaughter, 7 months old and hadn't seen older sister for over a year. Seeing them walk down the corridor from customs was the best sight I've seen in ages. No question where I had to be today, with family.

Early

Monday the 14th - We were closed all day again today. We did a lot more cleaning out. Mrs. H and I cleaned out the Professional Library. No one really uses them, so it was time to clean them out. I also gleaned out some old paperwork. I kept some of the more recent things, but all the rest went into the recycled paper bin. Packed up more books for suplus.

Friday, May 11, 2012

Sequestered

Today the library was fully used by the AP Testing, so we were all in the back working. Mrs. M did an amazing job knocking off the inventory of books in. I worked with Mrs. H on cleaning stuff out. Took in batteries so I could test remotes for equipment we have and found quite a few! The rest are in the 'free' pile. Cleaned out boxes stacked in places, took cardboard to the recycler bin, filled a whole pushcart bin with stuff to throw away and leafed through most of the old yearbooks to see which ones were all in one piece and which were cut up. So funny to start running into teachers who started here in 1983 and how they looked then! Mrs. H also found an original copy (we think) of the land deed to Sprague from 1934! It looked pretty authentic to Mrs. H and I! She took it to Mr. S, our principal and he is going to take it to the district legal/archive/important things people to make sure it's all good!

Thursday, May 10, 2012

Purge!

Got one of the back rooms all cleaned out today and after the tech crew went through the boxes of cords and techie what nots, we tossed it in the purge dumpster. Got stuff up on shelves in the back. The last of the Principles of Technology Unit 1 and the new Algebra Connections Supplements all found a home on the shelves. I also went through all our yearbooks and organized them by years. Some only have one for a year, others had up to five copies! When we got back into the library I ran the rest of the inventory reports and checked the barcodes on the remotes. Checked out the list of books to a teacher that Mrs. M had just hand written them out to him before I got in. Went to my Thursday morning meeting and those are now over for now. The tech guys just need to do some tweaking on the program, but otherwise it's just about ready to go. We had a former student/library aide stop by today who joined the Navy and it was so good to see him! Mrs. M and I both gave him a big hug, he looks so much more mature since December - they have done him well!

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

ER

Had to leave early today because my hubby had to go to the ER! His boss called and asked if I'd come and get him and by the time I got over there, he had called the ambulance and they were just taking him away - he is fine, and the office staff were wonderful, shooing me off to be there for my hubby. Worked in the back all morning, getting stuff pulled from the back room, recycling, taking things to the techies to see what they want to keep and putting other things up for grabs. Turned in the order to get new Realidades 3 books.

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

AP Testing

Well, only for the second part of the day. We had to close the library at 11am so they could get set up for the AP Art History test. I ran reports all morning to do inventory in the back, and put a bunch of stuff back there to work on once we had to depart the library. Mrs. M and I brought in treats for the classified staff meeting and it was her turn to attend, so I let her and helped Mrs. H get things ready. After the kids came in, we retreated to the back and started to clear out all the cabinets in the back workroom that will be converted over to the Oly store in the fall. We recycled and took some stuff to put in the 'purge' dumpster, only to not find it! They had taken it to dump Friday and not brought the new one in yet! So, at least we got out of the building and enjoyed a brief moment in the sun. I found a bunch of remotes and some that had barcodes on them so I will check them to see if they are still valid or not and if they work on any of our current machines. Got in the pricing on Realidades 3 books and need to find the class counts to decide on how many we will puchase. Got another publisher to send us some trial resources for Conceptual Physics that a couple of teachers want to use next year. Packed up three more boxes of magazine holders for another school and got them out to be picked up and sent over. A great day, a lot done, going home well satisfied.

Forgotten

Monday the 7th - Totally forgot to post yesterday, just too busy after a great weekend out camping in our new trailer! But I did manage to get to work :) Went in early since there was a staff meeting in the afternoon and the library would be closed. Worked on clearing out my shelves of books at my desk to be loaded onto shelves in the depository - and can I get a big 'Halleluah?' *cups hand to ear* 'Ah, thought so!' Yes, all my repair pile is gone, put away and there are no more books waiting on the shelf and the record of who's waiting for repairs is all empty! That is the most exciting news! There were books on there I just didn't want to tackle, that are now tackled and done with! Checked in and out books and redid my bulletin board of books out and how much they cost. Another early day tomorrow!

Friday, May 4, 2012

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle

Came in to find some teachers had left materials in the back that they were cleaning out, so I went through them and checked in, withdrew (old old books), and cleaned out notebooks recycling them and setting out the empty notebooks for any that needed some and some were taken last I looked! I feel good reusing things like the blank sheets between transparencies - the kids can use that for scratch paper instead of the new computer printer paper, all the paper out of the notebooks went into recycling, cardboard and some heavy paper I will keep for book repair - a good haul all in all :) Processed in six magazines for the library and checked in and out books all day, did a few little repair jobs here and there.

Thursday, May 3, 2012

A Day

Today we learned that our student with pancreatic cancer passed away last night - a beautiful girl, just 17 who loved the life she had. We had counselors in the library for the first half of the day for anyone that needed it. My meeting this morning was cancelled and since I was at home, I drove all the way downtown (15 min.) to find out I just needed to turn around and go to school. Did some repairs today, checked out books. Cleaned off my desk from all the repairs - I think I only have about 5 books to go! Packed up another box of magazine holders for an elementary school and packed up more surplus books. Sent out my response for the inventory to our inventory team and Mr. C thought I did a good job of answering the questions raised. Getting ready for AP testing for next week when we won't have access to the library and need to just work in the back so we think we'll pack up surplus equipment and inventory our books.

Wednesday, May 2, 2012

9 Boxes

That's right, shipped out 9 boxes of magazine holders to other schools today and we still have a hundred or so that we can send out. I hope more ask tomorrow! Worked on the Conceptual Physics books - the rep sent me a link to the high school version, so that's good! Just need to see if the lab manual works with that too, or if there's a high school lab manual we need to get instead. Didn't hear from the Realidades people, so hopefully tomorrow we will. Mrs. H and Mrs. M finally realized I had snuck my birthday past them and today I came in to some presents and a hat that said "Yes, we forgot your birthday!" then they both put on hats that said "Sorry!" on them, it was funny! Then they treated me to a Subway sandwich for lunch :) Checked in and out books here and there, cleared off a billed book. Worked with Mrs. H on some electronic books and sent out some answers to the inventory program I've been helping with to one of our tech crew here in the building.

Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Lost

Worked on some repairs today, processed in six magazines for the library and one for teachers. Checked out Of Mice and Men. Packed up West's Fahrenheit 451 they had lent since we won't be using them after all and a few other books of theirs that we had as well. Worked some more on the Conceptual Physics books and contacted the publisher to see if they had a high school version. Contacted another rep to see about ordering the Realidades 3 books to go with our 1 and 2 books. Mrs. H had to leave at 2 for an appointment so I kept the library open until my time and was very busy. My sad part of the day was declaring 'lost' the books that were still checked out to two students, one who has already left this world and one that is holding on by the slimmest threads. We didn't feel comfortable asking the families at this time to return books, so by declaring them lost, they are still in the system, but the families won't be billed for anything inadvertently. We talked with our bookkeeper and will ask the counselors to advise us on what to do.