The daily life of a Middle School Library Media Assistant.

Friday, June 21, 2013

Gone

Crazy year, crazy times. Finished up my last three hours this morning, resetting and labeling shelves, got in a shipment of books another school had borrowed and returned. Finished up the cost proposal for the AP Chemistry books and turned that into our office manager. Turned in my 'where will you be' sheet, check off sheet, turned in my keys, badge and parking space tag. See you August 20th! Off to Ireland I go!

Thursday, June 20, 2013

Defrosting

Oh my! Our little fridge has the worst case of icing I've ever seen! Cleaned it out today after my lunch and tried to chip at it, and decided it was a hopeless case. So, it's started to melt off and I took some old VHS tape cases (still in their wrappers!) propped up the front of the fridge, and hopefully all the water will stay down in the bottom until I get in tomorrow! I did put some towels up at the front, but hopefully they won't be needed. Renumbered shelves today and worked on getting an accurate count on the books for the Earth Science texts since they may be taking some of them off to other schools. Redid all the shelf signs for texts because I've gotten rid of so many, moved others, had arrows and write-ins... they were a mess! So, since next year I'll really have to rely on our aides, I thought I'd better get all those in shape. Sent out seven boxes of texts today back to their homes as well. Three hours to go!

Wednesday, June 19, 2013

It's a Wash

Brought home the last of the dirty rags we use to clean the library with and they are in my machine getting all clean! Moved books all over today. Got all the new Spanish books on the shelves, but old Spanish and Civics on carts in the back. Moved old Civics books too since we only use about two class sets to make room for more AP Gov and AP History books that we'd bought in the fall and have been on tables, etc. all year. Still have teacher resources on our Chemistry student edition list, so after I finished up doing status and numbers on the Chemistry books, I quick wrote up a list of the teacher resources ISBN numbers and the barcodes that went with them and sent that off to our textbook guy. It'll be good to have that all cleaned up. Got our table almost all unloaded in the back, took off the reading lit sets that no one wants to use anymore and put up the lit sets that people want to keep off the cart we had corraled them on. Things are getting put away and tidied up, always a good thing! I'll ship stuff out tomorrow, found a few more things and the books I didn't take last week. Mrs. H came in today and it was good to see her. She also talked with Mr. S about our computer labs for next year and how we will do them.

Tuesday, June 18, 2013

Inventory

Got all the magazine order all set and turned that in today. Sent an email to our Pearson rep that I needed to get the right ISBN's on the quote for the fall. Helped Mrs. M today and finished up the library inventory. Mrs. M did all the fiction and the non-fiction 000 - 700's! So I did the 800's and 900's today, only had about 5 books still missing off the list from what I did. Then I worked on the Chemistry books, doing their status and numbering until it was time to go! I worked seven hours today, and will tomorrow and Thursday, and that'll leave me just 3 hours to finish up for the school year on Friday. My hubby has Friday off, so we may go adventuring!

Monday, June 17, 2013

Magazine Order

Worked on that most of the morning today and had to call a teacher, even though they are off, to get a final yes or no on a title. Just need two more admin approvals and I'll be ready to submit to our office manager. Got a price quote from our Pearson rep, but it doesn't look quite right as I got ready to leave, so I'll go over it in the morning. Worked on shifting the Chemistry books and putting on status and book numbers, got to have room if we get in the AP Chemistry books. A good day, four to go!

Friday, June 14, 2013

Last Luncheon

Today we had our end of the year luncheon with all the other media assistants and librarians that could make it. It took a chunk of the day since we had to go up to Keizer, but always worth it! Got rid of two boxes of books and will ship the rest. Moved out all the poor/fair copies of the Fundamentals of College Physics books. Kept the nice good copies which made room for the the Conceptual Physics books we got in last fall. Also moved over the Essentials of Electronics from there since no one has been using them either into the Industrial Arts section. Started to clean out the Earth Science books, keeping a very nice stash for us and if they transfer them out, they can have the more used copies! Also noticed that out of our 120 Conceptual Physics books that we had as teacher sets, 18 of them did not come back home. I think the loss in case they don't return with the cost of the book - $80.47 with 10% S+H comes to over $1,500! I let our textbook admin and our principal know - with the fact that my monthly gross pay is just about that much. Only five days to go next week and we're done for the summer!

Thursday, June 13, 2013

Amadeus

Awesome lunch today at one of our favorite places, Amadeus! They used to be just a couple of blocks from Sprague, but they've moved downtown, so we took the time and drove down, had the fabulous Potato Torta and came back to work. Yummm! Checked out teachers today and we're down to 1,502 books still checked out. Billing rolls out for the kids tonight, so we'll see how much money walked out the door tomorrow! Fines today were a little over $8,000 from the seniors. Contacted the other high schools and I'm taking over the books that we have from them for our end of the year luncheon tomorrow. Five boxes for four of the schools. I had to find them and then transfer the copies and then box them up. Cleaned up lots of little stuff along with getting the teachers taken care of. Had a big bruhaha over Earth Science books. We still have classes next year for that and they wanted to ship them all over the district. I told them if we kept 70 for our two class sets, that would only leave 135 to send to the four other schools. I guess that idea is on hold for the moment.

Wednesday, June 12, 2013

1792

I was hoping for more in today, but I'll take it! Amazing help again today from some students and our wonderful student teacher Mr. B! Checked in all day and put away books! Last day for students and tomorrow is the last day for teachers. I hope to work on some more shelf room before we're done on the 21st!

Tuesday, June 11, 2013

3,154

It'll be crazy tomorrow, but today we got in a bunch and with great help from a student teacher we got everything put away. Getting ready to really get the books in tomorrow we hope! Transferred some food service books to McKay as well today, and found some Chemistry books that are checked out to students, but the program won't let me check them in because they belong to another school - what?? So we have to figure out how to take care of that. Last day for students tomorrow!

Monday, June 10, 2013

4,060

That's how many textbooks were still out this afternoon when I left. We took in probably over a thousand today and there will be more tomorrow! I think when all is said and done, we'll probably have about a thousand still checked out with teacher materials and the students that didn't get everything in! You heard it here! A prediction! So yeah, the main focus of today was getting in those books! We had some wonderful help in the back and I hope they get all done and we're all set for tomorrow!

Friday, June 7, 2013

Graduation Tonight!

A long day of putting books away, getting the seniors cleared of their books and fines. Left school today with everything put away :) Back tonight to meet Mrs. H and watch our amazing seniors graduate!

Thursday, June 6, 2013

Senior Awards

Today is a real highlight for the year as we went into the stadium to listen to the awards our seniors earned for the year. So inspiring! What an amazing group of young people embarking on the next part of their journey. Mrs. M stayed in the library and Mrs. H and I went out and watched. Clapped for our favorites and shed a few tears. Truly, an honor to spend my time cheering on these amazing people! The rest of the day was all about books and checking them in and putting them away. Huzzah! I did stay a bit later since I'd spent an hour and half at the ceremony and got every book from today put away. Had a little bit of help from Mrs. M and a student, but all our aides were seniors and are gone!

Wednesday, June 5, 2013

2013

So we went out today and the senior prank was to put '2013' in window paint on every car back window! I was happy that they didn't do it on my Miata, until I left to go home and they weren't certain I think about the back window, so they painted it on the front window! Today was a great check in day and we worked hard on getting the seniors the info they needed to graduate. We checked their accounts both in textbook and library to make sure they were clear. Put a lot of books away as well. OSHA received a complaint so a bunch of people were in testing around the school for asbestos! Good thing, I knew it was around but now it will all get taken care of from the bond work last summer. We found a student who had a book out from South HS and he thinks it's all fine, but I panicked and I knew that he'd be in for a bad surprise, so I emailed South and talked with bookkeepers and counselors, so I hope he finds the book and gets that taken care of. Off to clean off my window!

Tuesday, June 4, 2013

Waiting for the Onslaught

Which never really came. I was expecting a ton of seniors to turn stuff in, but it just hasn't happened, really. This morning we ran a report with 45 pages to it, and this afternoon we were down to 33, but that's still a lot! Did check in a lot of books, put lots of books away. We were all cleaned up and ready for tomorrow by the time we left. Worked on status for the America Pathways books when I didn't do anything else. Garten came and picked up all our surplus boxes so I was glad those were all taped, labeled and ready to go when they arrived! Processed in two magazines for teachers and four for us. Made sure that students not only knew if they had all their textbooks in or not, but also the library side to make sure they were clear with us. Had another student bring in a replacement book for Introduction to Sports Medicine so I processed that in. Sent off a box of Biology books that belong to North. I'm about out of all my boxes with everything I've packed this last month. Back to it tomorrow - the seniors finish off everything tomorrow!

Monday, June 3, 2013

Support

Mrs. H was gone this morning and I was very busy with books and such. Got an email from one of our admins that he gave permission to waive a fine. A student had come to me claiming that her book was in a water damaged condition when we checked it out to her and I said, ah, no, if we had done that for any reason, we would have also attached a note to the book, so I billed her for the $131.96 the book cost. She went to the admin and told him the story and though he was nice about it, he decided since she was trustworthy, to excuse the fine. I got in a snit and marched the book over to his office and told him he could give her this $131 graduation present, handed him the book and marched back to the library. A few minutes he came down all lionish and ruffled telling me hadn't he supported me, and now I needed to support him. I asked had he even looked at the book or asked any of us about it before the decision was made, no. But he didn't see the book was unusable, since probably only about a seveneth of the book was in a very wrinkled state. I told him that it would mold,  you could really smell it, and after it did, we couldn't check it out to anyone else. I said I was done, and he marched off. *Sigh* he said it wasn't a question of who to believe, but that he's worked with this student and knows this student. Ah, no, but I waived the fine, let the bookkeeper know and copied him on it as well. Checked in a lot of books today and put them away. I like to try and get everything put away before I leave for the day. I did a few other things as well, and if I remember them, I'll stick them in!