What has been happening in our branches?

We have just had a very successful holiday program and involvment in National Youth Week. Thanks to everyone that came along and supported the Bookmark Tour at Kyabram, Echuca and Rochester Branches. We also hope that the children and their parents enjoyed the Scientwists shows at the same branches. A visit from a Mermaid captivated the children at Kyabram Branch soon after we opened the library at the new site. Above are some of the photos from these special events. Next Monday 4th May we have special guest author Barry Heard who will be presenting a talk at the Echuca Civic Centre from 2pm. Barry will speak about his book and his experiences in Vietnam. Information or bookings 54821997. Soon it will be Library and Information Week which includes celebrating the National Simultaneous Storytime Pete the Sheep and "New Book" morning teas (in conjunction with Australia's Biggest Morning Tea) We are also involved at the Playgroup Playday next Tuesday 5th May at Apex Park Echuca from 10am. The following week we are promoting National Families Week at our storytimes. So there is something for everyone. If you need further information about any of these activities please contact one of our staff today on 1300 666 535 or pop into one of our branches. A reminder that our Kyabram Branch is now located at Lake Rd with the Shire of Campaspe Customer Service Centre, it's new name is Kyabram Library and Community Hub. Come in and enjoy the new comfortable surroundings, we are open from 9-5 Monday and Friday, 9-6 Tuesday and Thursday, 9-7 on Wednesdays and 10-1 on Saturdays.

One year on ....

We have just celebrated our first year being part of the SWIFT consortium. What does that mean to you? - access to nearly 2,800,000 items from the other participating libraries for free. Since we have joined the SWIFT consortium we have borrowed 4625 items from the other member libraries, and we have actually lent out 7807 of our items to the other members. The photo shows the amount of traffic that goes between our branches on a weekly basis. What a great caring, sharing bunch we are! It can be gauged as a tremendous success and we are pleased to announce that other libraries will be joining us soon to widen the choices even more. The SWIFT consortium recently won the LG PRO Award for Excellence for Innovative Management Initiative”. We also have access to another shared system called Library Link Victoria which will be upgraded over the next few months giving us even more choice and selection options to all our valued library customers. There are great advantages of being part of collaborative systems like these because they provide additional benefits to everyone. If you would like more information about our online services, or how to set up your own account so you can order material online or renew your items please contact us today on 1300666535 or email us at libraries@campaspe.vic.gov.au Remember that we have some fantastic resources available from our website including free online tutoring for students from year 4-12 and a range of authorative databases that can be accessed by just using your library card.

Kyabram Library and Community Hub Officially Opened

On Tuesday 24th March Minister Richard Wynne officially opened the new Kyabram Library and Community Hub. The library is now operating successfully in its new home at the Lake Rd site, along with the Customer Service Centre, Toy Library, Historical Society and Family History group. Many community members came along to the opening, as well as the media from WIN TV and Kyabram Free Press and we thank all for their support. Minister Wynne and Councillor Howell both spoke very favourably about the facility and highlighted the 60% increase in space, additional library hours and the improved facilities for the public and the staff. The new shelving and the children's area, as well as the glass frontage and pleasant outlook were all big hits. The library will now be available from 8.30am every day and open till 5pm on Mondays and Fridays, 6pm on Tuesday and Thursdays and 7pm on Wednesdays, also Saturday from 10-1. The library staff will commence at 10am each day except for Wednesdays when it will be 12pm. The public now have nearly the double of hours of opening now that it is the new location. So come along, and enjoy the new surroundings. Thanks to the project team, ably led by Keith Edwards, who have created a wonderful library out of the existing Shire building.

FOLA Eric Flynn Award for library services to older adults

The Campaspe Regional Library are thrilled to receive the Eric Flynn Award for Library Services for Older Adults from the Friends of the Library Australia. We recently held a celebration dinner to recognise and thank the efforts of our Words on Wheels Storytellers. It was a very happy occasion and we thank FOLA President Dr. Alan Bundy AM for attending the evening and presenting the award to Valerie Hansen, WOW Coordinator and Jenny Mustey, Library Services Manager. Dr. Bundy spoke very highly of the program and believes it is a model worthly of emulation by other councils and their library services throughout Australia. We are extremely proud of the way the program is reaching over 380 residents in aged care facilties each month. Valerie has put a huge amount of time in researching the stories, poems and pictures that are developed into storytelling kits on a vaste range of themes. The storytellers are all enthusiastic and bring many talents and ideas to the sessions. We also appreciate the important support from all lifestyle and activity coordinators at the various facilties, without this it would be very difficult to conduct the program. We look forward to the opportunity of speaking of the program at a conference in May which is focussing on library services to older adults.

Our building projects

We are moving along with the Echuca Community Hub Library project and are right in the middle of the detailed design phase. Concept plans are now available for viewing at the current Echuca Library in High Street or a bigger version is available on the windows at the new library site in Anstruther Street. It is an exciting stage to be working out the finer details with the architect and interior design, as well as sorting out all the engineering and infrastucture details. Hopefully in a couple of months this stage will have been completed and we can then move to the constuction stage including the tender process and commencement of building works. The Kyabram Community Hub Library is also on track, with painting, carpeting and a bit more demolition to occur over the next month or so. We have designed quite an innovative reception/library desk and we will be installing state-of-the-art mobile library shelving wherever possible in the building to create as much flexibility as possible. It is going to be a very comfortable and pleasant library and Customer Service Centre and we look forward to moving to the new location by March. If you have any queries please contact the Library Services Manager on 5482 1997.

Awesome holiday fun

It is hard to know where to start, we have been so busy in our branches since we reopened on the 5th and we can't believe the holidays are nearly over. There has been some great things happening for the children since the first week, we have had scrapbooking and collage workshops with Lynne Hume, painting workshops with Paul Gamble, Digital storytelling and podcasting with Daryll Bellingham (all of these stories are on the Austory blog which is linked on our homepage) and last night our special guest Summer Read author Steven Conte spoke at Radcliffes in Echuca. There is still more to come with all branches running game sessions this coming week, as well as a twilight storytime at Kyabram. We have also launched our bookcrossing zones at all our branches, for more information about that go to http://www.bookcrossing.com/ As well as all those activities our new Kyabram branch building works are well underway and we will moving in there in a few weeks time. And the plans for the new Echuca Library are available at the site, as well as the current Echuca Branch and Echuca Council Offices. We are in the detailed design phase which is getting very exciting, so hopefully this time next year we will be getting closer to moving in to the Echuca Community Hub Library.

We look forward to sharing more news about our great library service over the coming months.

But for now can we say a big thankyou to everyone for suppporting our holiday activities.

Christmas Greetings

It is hard to believe that it really is that time of the year for Christmas storytimes and holiday activities. We have had a very busy few weeks leading up to out short break. All our library branches will be closed from today until Monday January 5 2009. After hours return chutes are available at all branches during this time. When we return we are launching right into a great range of Summer Read activities for children and adults. Most activities are free but do require booking in. Highlights over the summer holidays include hosting our Summer Read author Stephen Conte on January 15 at Radcliffes. We are also conducting art workshops with local artists so children from our Shire can send their artwork over to our sister city Shiroi. We currently have a range of artwork from Shiroi being displayed in our libraries. We also have special guest Darryl Bellingham all the way from Queensland to take us on digital storytelling journeys. There is also scrapbooking, games, twilight storytimes and lots of prizes to be won. This is a great time of the year so come along and join in. All details about the Summer Reading Club are on our website. We have a number of storytimes over the last few weeks so we have included a few photos. Look forward to posting some more blogs for you in 2009.

Regards, the Campaspe Regional Library team