The SCASL Annual Conference is March 24 – 26, 2010 in Charleston – join us! The Call to Conference and registration form are available here.

NEW this year – you can register online!

Be sure to include the person’s name, office you are nominating them for, and their contact information.

SCASL Friends,

As most of you are aware, we have been working with the association management company, Capital Consultants, for the last year. A management taskforce was appointed in the spring to solicit feedback and evaluate our services with Capital Consultants. The taskforce reported to the SCASL board in June, and the board ultimately voted to discontinue service with Capital Consultants after September 30^th, 2009.

 In place of this service, the board voted to go back to having our own executive secretary, but to also procure the services of an event planner/conference planning company so that we could continue to grow and provide better member service at our yearly conference. SCASL has contracted with TMC, Total Management Concepts to assist with the running of our 2010 conference. This is the same company that works with SCAET to run the yearly EdTech conference.  

 The existing job description for the executive secretary position has been updated, and the board is ready to open this position immediately so that someone will be in place by September 30^th.  The updated job description is attached. Interested parties should send a resume and letter of interest to me via the contact information listed below. Email, fax and mail applications will be accepted, the position will remain open until filled.

 Please feel free to distribute information on this job opening on other lists -

 I look forward to serving the organization this year! If there is anything I can do for you, or if you have any suggestions for improving our organization, please let me know.

 Amanda  

 Amanda S. LeBlanc, President, South Carolina Association of School Librarians

505 North Main Street

Greer, SC   29650

voice (864) 355-8275
fax (864) 355-8281

email: aleblanc@greenville.k12.sc.us

ExecutiveSecretaryJobDescription

SCASL Updates!

Remember, you can always use our NING to stay “in the know” too!

*READ IN 2009 was a wonderful day of celebrating reading. Thank you to Ida Thompson for all of her hard work organizing the event. Pictures are available on our Flickr page

*Jamie McKenzie (From Now On ) will be in Charleston on May 1 for an exciting day of hands-on learning activities devoted to the concepts of originality, synthesis, invention, imagination and novelty. This workshop will focus on the AASL standards as well as 21st Century Skills and the ISTE standards. Click here for a full description Jamie McKenzie is offering SCASL a $25 discount for this workshop. When you register online, just include the code libmed

*Lake Murray Elementary School in Chapin, South Carolina is hosting a Celebration of Life Ceremony for Penny Hayne. As you know, Penny Hayne passed away in November and her elementary school is honoring her on May 17 at 3pm. The principal asked that I let everyone know so that you can join in celebrating Penny’s life.

*Join us for the 2009 SCASL Summer Institute: Gaming for Learning! Gaming across America has become a way for libraries to encourage play, socialization, cultural enrichment and learning. Public libraries have become the leader in gaming utilization in the library communities but the academic and school communities are quickly increasing their gaming participation. Electronic and board gaming are both becoming an exciting way for libraries to increase their patron base. There will be hands on time to play games for learning! The SCASL Summer Institute is partnering with the Upstate Technology Conference in Greenville this year.

Details – 1 – 7pm (there will be a break for dinner)

June 23, 2009

JL Mann High School

Greenville, South Carolina

Register online (the SCASL Summer Institute is listed as a Pre-Con for UTC)

It’s FREE!

Engaging Students in the Making of Good New Ideas

Could we challenge our own kids to make a better one?

Folks have emailed me about this, so I thought I’d make a general announcement:

If you forgot to turn your scan card in, you can mail it to me at:
505 North Main Street
Greer, SC 29650

We are not dependent on the card to create your transcript, HOWEVER it helps keep down recurring costs to SCASL when we don’t have to purchase new cards every year, AND if your card was/is turned in, you’ll be entered in the drawing for a free registration to next year’s conference.

Oh… and I also heard from Doug Johnson who made it home safely and had this to say about our conference:
“Just wanted to say thank you so much for the opportunity to work with your South Carolina librarians this past week. I had a great time. The people in the sessions were great, the conference was well-organized, and people were all just as nice as could be.”

SCASL is the best!!

Amanda

A huge thank you to everyone who helped make the 2009 SCASL conference a success! The rain held off until just after we left on Friday – the power of positive thought??? : )

I heard some great feedback and suggestions at conference -  if you didn’t get a chance to fill out the conference evaluation, please take a moment to fill our the survey. We can’t improve the conference without your input! Go to:

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=dROTcxeMnFYbr71MR_2b2N2w_3d_3d to complete the evaluation. Keep those comments coming – how could the schedule be improved? What really worked this year? What authors/speakers would you like to see at the 2010 conference? Obviously there are some things that are beyond the steering committee’s ability to change, but we take your comments and suggestions very seriously and everyone on the committee works hard to make conference the BEST professional development for media specialists in SC!!

I’ve had some texts and emails from some of our presenters – Dianne de Las Casas shared with me that she thought this was the most enjoyable state conference she had EVER attended – I think she loved us as much as we loved her and she was very sad to leave. She will be at AASL in the fall – if you are going, keep a look out for her! If you didn’t get to see one of her sessions, you missed a treat! I’ve heard from Dan Yaccarino and Phil Bildner and they were both impressed with our membership and were glad that they had a chance to come to our conference (neither had ever attended before).

I am compiling the handouts and presentations that were submitted before conference, and we’ll be posting those soon! We did several things during conference to be able to share some of the highlights of conference with folks who couldn’t attend – be looking for more information to come!

Don’t forget to register for the Read In! You can find the application here:

http://www.scasl.net/documents/readin-form.pdf

Next year’s conference is in Charleston, March 10-12th, 2010. I know libraries be facing many of the same economic problems as we did this year, but I hope we’ll be able to see a great group there next year!

2008 – 2009 South Carolina Book Award Winners.

Picture Book Award – Hero Cat by Eileen Spinelli.  There were 243 schools participating with 54,971 students who voted.  Hero Cat won by 8,291 votes.

Children’s Book Award – How to Steal a Dog by Barbara O’Connor.  There were 184 participating schools with 10,495 students who voted.  How to Steal a Dog won by 1,330 votes.

Junior Book Award – Cracker!: the Best Dog in Vietnam by Cynthia Kadohata.  There were 98 schools participating with 6,210 students who voted.  Cracker! won by 850 votes.

Young Adult Book Award – New Moon by Stephenie Meyer.  There were 73 participating schools with 2,024 students who voted.  New Moon won by 487 votes.