Literacy Is Topic of Library Board Meeting

The Marinette County Consolidated Public Library Committee heard an enlightening report at their Thursday, April 19 meeting about the efforts underway to establish a Literacy Council in Marinette and Oconto counties. Janet Glime of the newly formed council addressed the group on its history, status and plans.

Glime said a need for literacy education has long been needed. Studies have found that low literacy rates in the two-county section of the state are relatively high, and the problem appears to be more prevalent in the county compared to the cities. Many times a low literacy rate is predominate in an area where English is a second language, she said, but that doesn’t seem to be the case with these counties where the problem is home-grown.

Aware of this problem, several persons gathered to form the Literacy Council. Part of the process was to formulate by-laws and make application for non-profit status, both of which are in the works. Once the non-profit status has been granted by the state, then the organization can apply for grants to purchase materials and testing supplies. Glime reported some materials have been coming from other literacy councils.

Another problem for the local organization is that there is no one to train the volunteer tutors to help people learn how to read better. Glime explained she herself has now become trained in methods of teaching literacy and has taken on some of the training responsibilities. Classes to train the tutors take about 12 hours, and she has plans to begin another class in the fall.

The next step is getting referrals and developing sources of students. The target audience for students is solely adults. Glime noted the school districts do an excellent job of teaching reading skills to school age students but the Literacy Council hopes to reach out to area adults who, for whatever reason, want to improve their reading abilities. To that end, the Literacy Council prefers to use public buildings as meeting places, but in a very discrete way since low reading ability does cause some people a certain amount of embarrassment and shame.

Glime described some of the current classes taking place in the Coleman Library. She was thankful for the assistance given by the Village of Coleman for allowing the council to use a room at the Coleman Municipal Building for storage and their material library.

The Literacy Council wishes now to get the word out into the community that their service is available to any resident in the two counties. People who are interested in what the program can do for them, or if you know someone who is, can call Glime at 920-897-4422.

Following the presentation, the committee discussed ways in which the County Library can assist. Director Jennifer Thiele noted she is well-versed in the work of literacy education through her labors with the education endeavors at the county jail. She said she would be willing to put together a list of books that are available for literacy students.

In other matters on the agenda, Thiele presented her monthly director’s and Library Service Activities reports. She said the countywide tornado drill went very smoothly at the Marinette Library. Several activities, both for staff and for patrons, marked the recent National Library Week. She reported on her experience of doing a recent live radio broadcast on Bay Cities Radio and spoke of meetings she held with the county Building and Properties director regarding cleaning, and the County Administrator about security and plans for video security. Also discussed by Thiele were the possibility of public training for E-book readers and even purchase of seeral readers for the public.

In preparation for a presentation at a major conference in August, Thiele commented on the survey work she is doing on the way people search for E-book titles. The emphasis of her presentation will be on ways libraries can better serve and service users of the new technology.

A printed report was distributed on the excellent work and exciting activities that have taken place at the Wausaukee Library Branch, which included a program on Vertical Veggies and a story times on Wild Beasts, Wind, Manners and Shapes. The Veggie program was given by Scott Ruess of the UW-Extension with seven persons in attendance. The Storytimes are hosted by library staff and usually incorporate different types of hands-on activities and snacks. The Storytimes average just over 20 in attendance.

Thiele reported the ill-fated Media Box (disk rental system) which the committee discussed at the last meeting was picked up by the company on April 11. Per the agreement worked out by Thiele, the library will be getting back all of the money paid for the system. The committee discussed the other options available for something similar and what kind of system would be most appropriate for the it’s needs.

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