 Good morning and welcome to this week's edition of Encompass Live. I am your host, Krista Porter, here at the Nebraska Library Commission. Encompass Live is a commission's weekly webinar series where we cover a variety of topics that may be of interest to libraries. We broadcast the show live every Wednesday morning at 10 a.m. Central Time. But if you're unable to join us on Wednesdays, that's fine. We do record the show as we are doing today. And then it is posted to our website in our archives for you to watch at your convenience. And I will show you at the end of today's show where you can access all of those recordings. Both the live show and recordings are free and open to anyone to watch. So please do share with your friends, family, neighbors, colleagues, anyone you think might be interested in any of the shows we have on Encompass Live. The Encompass Live Commission is the state agency for libraries in Nebraska and we provide services to all types of libraries in Nebraska in the state. So you will find shows on Encompass Live for all sorts of libraries. Public K-12, academic corrections, museums, archives, et cetera, et cetera. Really our only criteria is something to do with libraries. We do presentations, book reviews, mini training sessions, demos of service and products offered. We have Nebraska Library Commission staff that come on to do presentations for us sometimes, and we have guest speakers that come on sometimes. Today we have a mixture of that. Today we are talking about, here are letters about literature. One of the letters we have with us is Tessa Terry, she's our communications coordinator here at the Library Commission. Good morning, Tessa. And Christy Walsh, who is the assistant library director at County Public Library. And they're both involved in the Nebraska Center for the Books of Letters about Literature program. So I'm just going to hand it over to both of you to take it away and tell us all about this year's program. Let's go. Um, let's see. Do you want to start Christy and just talk about the Letters about Literature program in general and how it works with the Center for the Book? I would be happy to. Thanks. The Nebraska Center for the Books supports programs that celebrate and stimulate public interest in reading books and the written word. And we are an affiliate center with the Library of Congress. What's about literature is one of the programs that historically was based or done cooperatively with the Library of Congress. And in the past couple of years has become the responsibility of the state centers for the book. So we are very excited to continue this program as a statewide reading and writing program. It offers readers the opportunity to write letters to a favorite author or to someone who wrote a book that moved them in some way. It's not a book report. It's to say, Hey, this book was wonderful. I want to tell you why or why it made a difference in your life. So there are opportunities for a variety of grade levels to participate. And to do that, you don't have to, you just need an adult to help you submit your application to send your letter in. And we look forward to seeing all of the creative letters that are written each year. Let's see. So here's just a little information about submission dates. So we always open the contest November 1 and we close it on December 31. So two months for people to submit their letters. In the past, people have done programs with this in the summer, and then save the letters to submit in November when the contest opens. So you don't have to write the letters in that time. You can write them anytime and just submit them when the contest opens. Let's see. So the information is always out there on the website at any time of year for people to go and look at and, you know, whenever you read something, whenever of someone you read something really cool and want to share. Yeah, exactly. Let's see. So, why the letters about literature program Christie. We've been doing this for many, many years. I want to say, maybe 18 something like that. Correct. Yes. Why letters about literature I know we got started on this because it was a Library of Congress program. Why is this a special program. I think it's a special program because it celebrates that connection between readers and writers that we've all met those books in our lives that touched us in some way and what a great way to reach out to those authors and say hey you made a difference because I'm listening to authors talk is a somewhat lonely vocation and the possibility to get some feedback or know that all of your labors that you put out there as this finished product made a difference in someone's life. What a great way to celebrate that and so when participants write those letters and send them in. We are so excited to as center for the book. To read those to know that books touch people and then celebrate those young authors the students who participate and share how a book made a difference in their life because that's a lifelong thing. Maybe we, you know, adults to it would be great to acknowledge but there's not a category for that at this point. So it is a special program it is done nationwide centers for the book across the country celebrate letters about literature and have slightly different model perhaps but there is an opportunity for students to participate in a letters about literature program across the country. So it's kind of fun also to see what our colleagues and other centers for the book are doing. And it's a great way for students to practice your writing skills I mean you get to do that all the time at school why not do something that is also fun. So, we want to celebrate that and very personal to you. Reading and, you know, being affected by a book is huge, very personal, it can be. Yeah, I think when we see letters. We see letters that come in that just have, you know, really personal themes from these students about why this book spoke so deeply to them. And the books really range pretty widely I mean we've had nonfiction books when fiction books poetry. Memoirs like it's across the board what kind of book will speak to a student and how it has just changed the way they see the world or see themselves. Yeah, those are deeply personal things and the courage it takes to write about them and then just send it off is really amazing I think. Definitely. And there's so many talented young people out there. If there's another opportunity to celebrate young writers. Yeah, let's see what we can do. Um, so it's been a couple years now since we stopped doing the national program or that since the Library of Congress stopped doing this as a national program through them. How is this different. How have we changed things just a little bit from when we did it with the Library of Congress. I think it's perhaps. I want to say it's more refined there aren't as many layers to it and so previously, people would submit their entries it would go to the Library of Congress in Washington DC and they did some. They looked at all the letters and kind of weeded things out or or so they pared down what actually came back to those centers to look for the awards. And that layer is no longer there. There were advantages and disadvantages to that but as a state we've been able to streamline it and maybe customize it so it works really well for our center for the book, and hopefully for all of the participants to the Nebraska Library Commission does amazing things. And some of it, you know, there's a lot of it behind the scenes but kudos to everybody at the commission. He's helped us reinvent letters about literature for the state of Nebraska and to continue it on and so we get the letters still and then we get to celebrate. So I'm, I'm really happy it. There was a little bit of a bumpy transition, but who doesn't need to challenge once in a while to keep us all on our toes perhaps. So I think we've come through that and now we're really ready to move forward in a great way. Yeah, I agree. I, I like that we have control of, you know, getting those letters submitted to us. Everybody has a problem submitting their letter they talked to me probably. And so it's really easy to fix things or try to make it easier for a student or teacher to submit or answer their questions because we have control of the submission process. And then I know some of our judges have just commented that knowing they get all the letters and not a weeded version of them. They like that idea. And it allowed us to tighten up the time frame to for the whole process that we didn't have a perhaps two month period in there where they were in Washington DC and we really didn't know the status and like Tessa said we couldn't answer questions because we didn't know where things were in the process. Yeah, so it's just more, we just definitely have more control of it. You've named no letters have been submitted or what was going on until you until they weeded and sent what they thought was good ones to you. They were all submitted to the National Center for the book and then they went through, did some rating and things on them and then sent back to us the ones they felt were viable submissions. Nice to be able to do it ourselves now. And it's nice to be able to answer a question, you know, if a letter would have gotten weeded back then we could not answer why it had gotten weeded, because we never saw it before then or could give, you know, notes on what happened then what went wrong. So, yeah, I like that we kind of have control of that. It has been a great partnership across the country is the centers for the book, even though the Library of Congress said we're no no longer going to be a part of this program. The centers across the country said this is still really important and each state has gone back and, and either reinvented or continued on what they were doing on a state level so it continues to be a priority for all of the affiliate centers, even without the direct involvement of the Library of Congress. Great. So, this is a slide of our award ceremony kind of at the last step of it but Christie do you want to go over what happens with the winners. Once we select those winning letters what that ceremony looks like. Well, I haven't been able to attend because of weather and a variety of other things. We do. The winners are notified. They are then recognized at a proclamation ceremony with the governor at the Capitol. And then we generally have a luncheon afterwards to celebrate the award winners they have the opportunity to read their letters and share those. And then we have awards for them as well. Did I leave something out there tells I'm sorry. The heritage room. Oops, yes. Okay, sorry. Once the winners are selected and we've had the celebrations then they are placed in the heritage room at the Bennett Martin Library, which is part of the Lincoln City's library so becomes part of that literary heritage of the state of Nebraska. Yeah, it's a really fun day. The kids get usually the morning off of school. And because it's usually on a Tuesday and Yeah, you get to see the Capitol, you get to have a fun lunch and then you see this really amazing room at the Bennett Martin Public Library where all these Nebraska authors have their work archived and saved and we save your letters so that it's your first work as a Nebraska author saved in the heritage room. So that's really fun. So they're like cataloged and they have in there as like authors. Yep, they have their own section and I know in the past. There was a situation where one of the students years later came back and she wanted a copy of her letter to read for some event, or for a family member. She didn't have her own copy but we had a copy of it in the heritage room that she could find. Yeah. That's great. And we have generous sponsors that help us with that too. And so, in the past humanities Nebraska houch and bindery Connie Osborne Center for the book, I'm forgetting somebody. We have generous bookstore in Seward I believe all all of those generous donors help continue the program and help make sure we can give awards to recognize each of these winners to So here we have just a list of ways librarians teachers parents can get involved and you know promote this program at their library. So a couple of them are just librarians partnering with teachers in their classroom media specialists, helping kids to select books. Sometimes you read a book and you just don't know how to, you know, lots of books affect you, but maybe you don't know which one you really want to talk about or which subject. And that's deeply about and that's really where parents and teachers and librarians can come in and help students, you know know the difference between a book they liked and a book that really affected them. So, just that having that connection and talking to them about books, really, you play a huge role in that. So here's one library as a place to find your book and sharing materials with your library users whether that's books bookmarks that we send you and book club kits or a little print out that the contest and how you submit your work. Here's one that kind of Christie touched on earlier about adults being able to write letters. Do you have any adults in your book clubs that would might be interested in writing their own letters as examples for these kids to let them know, you know what a letter even looks like sometimes kids don't even know what letters look like anymore. You know, and what the difference between writing a letter to an author is versus a book report summarizing what happened in the book. Those examples can be huge. And it's nice for them to see adults doing this too this isn't just something they're doing for school credit. It's something that you know reflective writing has a huge impact on students and adults, both you know that's why journaling and things like that are so huge so as a way to see that this is not just an assignment it's something they can carry through The ability to put your thoughts into words and do it in a concise thoughtful manner is a skill that it's a lifelong skill, you will use it again and again so even if you don't love writing. It is good to keep up with it and be able to do it well. Yeah, and that's the next one. Look for writing mentors from local writing groups or colleges that would be interested in working with kids on helping them with this reflective writing. Yes, homeschool groups. Lots of libraries homeschool groups use their public libraries as a resource. This would be a great project for them to work on. We have no stipulations on what kind of book has to be written about so it's totally up to them. And then what we've done in the past is libraries have hosted letter writing clinics as well. This was what I was talking about earlier where sometimes in the summer, or early in the school year libraries or media specialists have hosted letter writing clinics where they go through the whole process of finding a book, writing drafts of your letter, reading it to each other, working on that, and then they submit them together as a group so we have a lot of resources for letter writing clinics that you can access and we'll go through that as well. So this process has changed drastically just over the last, I mean, five years from mailing in a physical letter to a submitable process online when it was still with the Library of Congress. And now we have our own submission page here at the Nebraska Center for the book. So I'm just going to pop over. Let me just open my browser then. Okay, so on our Center for the book page under our programs tab. And our letters about literature page. We have a lot of great information for you. We have the 2021 guidelines that you can look up and that just tell you everything you need to know about submitting your letter submission dates, what we're looking for. Where to submit your letter we've got a URL on there. And then we also have some assessment things about what the judges are looking for and what the winners process looks like so this is all available on our website. But we have a huge submit button for you. It takes you to just this very simple form. And then what we're going to ask for is a school name and a school phone number. We don't ask for the students contact information. So if this is, this could be a library name or a library number. We just want an adults contact information if for some reason we can't get a hold of you by email. We have students first and last name, the students age, and since we have issues with kids under 13 submitting things. If you have a student that is under 13 as of November 1 this year. We just ask that you have a parent or legal guardian. Right in their name here to say that they consent to having their child's letter submitted electronically. We want to know what level you're in. So that's by grade level one four through six to seven through eight and level three is for high school students nine through 12th. And then we want to know your specific grade just so we know kind of where, whether you fall in the low end or the high end of there, just a little more information for us. But when they do the actual evaluation and competing they're grouped into those three levels. Right. Exactly. Yeah. And it's it's really only after we've selected winners that we go back and we we like to know that information just for our records to know that a sixth grader one or that a 12th grader run one kind of a thing. Here's the more more contact information. So we put a teacher's name or a teacher's name. This can be a library. This can be.