Elementary schools in Springfield, Illinois, USA — the state capital where Abe Lincoln rests — eliminated all librarian and assistant positions as part of big-time budget cuts. The State Journal-Register, in a hefty article, reports on the way each school is dealing with the situation. Or not.
Oh, the one person who knew how to operate the library automation system was riffed, too.
After seeing three comic strips touch on the subject of TV viewers and libraries this week, I had to check Chase\’s to see if there was some official event listed (there wasn\’t, unless you count Psychic Week). Take a look:
Fusco Brothers
Sylvia (look at 08/07/2002 in the archive)
Overdue (also see 08/09/2002)
Wired News reports that a community college in Iowa is colloborating on beta tests with tech companies in order to become a paperless campus. Instead of a \”library,\” the school has a \”resource center\” with computers, AV, and a few print periodicals. The article doesn\’t say whether they have a properly trained resource centerian.
Read the story here.
In this week\’s story line, the title janitor of the comic strip Frazz buys some new books for the library at the elementary school where he works.
I\’m sure I can\’t be the only one who thinks Frazz looks like a grown-up Calvin.
The principal of Landover Baptist Church\’s Elementary School has created an abridged, sex-free Bible. The principal is recommending to the church\’s board "that the new Bible, roughly the size of a theater program, be required reading in all classes in place of the salacious unabridged version."
Biologist and author Stephen Jay Gould died of cancer Monday. The NYT obit (registration required) says he passed away in a bed in his library, surrounded by books.
James Lileks bleats today about art in children\’s books (scroll down to second item).
After complaining about crap from the \’70s or England, he comments, "But there’s been a resurgence in the craft of children’s illustration, and the practitioners are almost entirely female."
This story about a sports reporter getting busted for arranging to meet with a "teen" (i.e., police posing as a minor online) for sex has a library tangent:
"Goldman had made one earlier attempt, last August, to meet the girl at the Warren-Newport Public Library in Gurnee. Police were waiting but they never saw him."
I\’m wondering who suggested the library as a meeting place, the guy or the cops?
A suburban Chicago man, already on probation for a similar offense, has been sentenced to 18 months "periodic imprisonment," with release only to attend work, for viewing child pornography online at a public library. He must also receive psychiatric and sex-offender treatment and stay off the Internet.
"It appears that his mother is babying him," said the judge.
Story in the Waukegan News Sun.
"J.K. Rowling: Harry Potter and Me" will be presented on A&E\’s Biography tomorrow. Friday, March 22, 8:00 p.m. Eastern and Pacific. Check your local listings.
The blurb says the show includes video footage of Rowling painting pentagrams on church doors and offering blood sacrifices to Satan. Just kidding. It says she was influenced by The Simpsons, though.
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