5.8. LIBSR 09-25-2018 5.8
Library Services Coordinator Report-Board Meeting-9-25-18
Summer reading program was a great success in Elk River this year. Our registered participants were up
by approximately 200 children/teens this year,compared to last year. We gave away 500 books,and
many other prizes as well. Our"passports"added a little extra to the program this year,and helped the
kids who were participating learn a little more about the community of Elk River by attending the
Farmer's Market or Elk River Fest. Thanks to Karen Wingard from the City of Elk River for coordinating
with me, and our Friends of the Elk River Library group for supporting these events with prize books.
In outreach news,we took our brain games kits"on the road"for an outreach event at Elk River
Guardian angels on September 5. We had 13 residents and staff who played games with us. I would
consider this a success! A special"Thank You"goes to Nora,one of our branch assistants,for putting
this program together.We will continue build community relationships and spread the word about our
"brain fitness kits" by taking this program out to another senior facility in the near future. We are
attending Elk River Farmer's Market one more time on Sept. 13 to promote upcoming programs. So far
this summer we have reached out to about 300 people at the Farmer's Market. We will also be doing a
Fall FairyTales outreach to a local preschool program,as well as participating in the Community Connect
event in October.
In children's programming, now that summer is over,things have slowed, but we are still offering some
great programs for children including our Lego hours, READ to a dog,and our storytimes. These
programs are usually full with between 12-20 children, plus their parents per session. We are also
continuing to offer our school age book club,and that program is building a nice following. On Dec.5&
6,we will be offering our Hour of Code classes,which had great participation last year,and we are
hoping for the same this year.
In teen and tween programs/services,we continue to offer our passive teen trivia contest,which draws
a good numbers of participants,particularly when the trivia questions are about the Harry Potter Series.
In July and August,we had almost 500 entries in the Harry Potter trivia contest. We are working on
building Teen book club as well,having established a couple of regulars,and asking them to invite their
friends.
For adult programming, we had a great turnout of 23 adults at our Twin Cities Sisters in Crime mystery
panel last week,and we hope to have at least that many when Allen Eskens,author of"The Life We
Bury"comes out on October 4. Our Crafternoon programs for adults have generally been full with 12-15
participants at each one. We will continue those into the fall,on Oct. 15 and Nov.26, as well as some
new classes about ancestry and genealogy,(Oct. 16) a class on communicating with
Dementia/Alzheimer's patients, (Nov. 15) and a class for budding writers to learn about National Novel
Writing Month,and our MN Writes/MN Reads database on Nov. 14. We have three concerts we are
offering this fall as well—one on Sept.20,and two in December on the 3&10.
There is a wide variety of offerings for all this fall-hopefully something to delight everyone!