Library

The Washington State Library has been pleased to host University of Washington Information School (iSchool) Open Data Literacy (ODL) intern Kathleen Sullivan this summer. This was the second year of the open data internship program at the UW iSchool, funded in part by a grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS). Open Data is the concept of freely-available, non-personal, machine-readable data. This year, four iSchool students were matched up with the City of Seattle, the Washington Department of Transportation, and the State Library.

From our standpoint here at the Washington State Library, one of the best things about this summer’s Washington Library Passport Project is that every week, we learn interesting and unique things about the libraries in Washington. Everyone knows about the spectacular architecture of Seattle’s flagship branch, but often our small libraries fly under the radar.

Recently a question hit the State Library Twitter feed that requires a little more explanation than Twitter's 280-character limit allows.

[gallery type="slideshow" link="file" size="full" ids="25117,25118,25119,25120,25121,25122,25123,25124,25125,25126,25127,25128,25129,25130,25131,25132" orderby="rand"] Last summer, the solar eclipse of 2017 was a HUGE event — and libraries stood at the epicenter. Eclipse glasses were sold out in stores, online, and pretty much everywhere. As a result, the small stash of glasses we saved at the Washington State Library to hand out on eclipse day became a truly hot commodity. Some people even camped out in their cars to be first in line for glasses!

On Saturday, June 30, Youth Librarian Erin Groth hosted this year’s summer reading kickoff party at the Washington Talking Book & Braille Library. It was a rockin' afternoon as staff, volunteers, and WTBBL patrons celebrated this year’s theme of LIBRARIES ROCK!

The Washington Talking Book & Braille Library (WTBBL) looks forward to hosting summer workers from the Youth Employment Solutions program once again in 2018. Administered through Washington State’s Department of Services for the Blind, Youth Employment Solutions (YES) is a six-week residential employment experience program for visually impaired and blind workers ages 16-20.

In fall 2017, the Washington State Library teamed up with the Imagine Children’s Museum of Everett, School’s Out Washington and the Spokane County Library District for a grant application to fund a program to promote literacy-based STEM activities for children ages 3 to 10 and their families. The application was successful.

This week marks the end of an era at the State Library as we lose Paul Longwell to the happy world of retirement. Paul has been on the IT staff of the State Library since 1989. Paul discussed the other day all the changes he has seen in his years on staff. The day he started, the Washington State Library had two servers with a total storage space of 10 MB, and two total IT staffers.

We are very pleased to announce that Washington’s Level 2 champion in the state Letters About Literature competition, Riya Sharma, was selected as a National Honor Award winner for her letter about The Confidence Code. Riya is an 8^th grade student at The Overlake School in Redmond.

How do you make history exciting and real to today’s always-connected students? You meet them online. For the last few years, the Washington State Library, Washington State Archives, and Legacy Washington have been meeting with Washington teachers.