Happy Tuesday everyone! This week’s message is packed with opportunities and tips & tricks to support your use of the WSDLC!
One Week Left to Complete the Annual WSDLC Membership Survey
The 2022 WSDLC Member Survey is an opportunity for members to provide valuable feedback to the WSDLC Board and Project Managers. The survey will help the WSDLC Board with the further development of the Consortium and the OverDrive service. We will share the survey results with the WSDLC membership at the April membership meeting.
We’ve had lots of valuable and insightful responses so far already; lets keep that momentum going! Your responses by March 15th will be greatly appreciated.
The survey should take no more than 15 minutes to complete. Thank you again for your time and thoughts!
Statement on the WSDLC Shared Collection
In response to content challenges WSDLC members are facing, the WSDLC has created and issued a statement on shared collections that has been approved by the WSDLC Board. This statement is available here, and is available to view and download from the WSDLC website:
Intellection Freedom page: https://wsdlc.org/for-members/collection-information/ifresources/<
Collection Information page: https://wsdlc.org/for-members/collection-information/
Please share this where it can be useful and let us know any questions at wsdlc-info@wils.org.
February’s Usage Statistics
In February, the shared collection saw a total of 129,392 checkouts, which includes ebooks, audiobooks, and magazines! Looking back to previous years, this is a 31% increase over 2021 (which saw 99,004 checkouts in February), and a whopping 241% increase of 2020 (which saw 37,908 checkouts in February). To further show the amazing growth the consortium has seen over the last few years, February 2022 had a total of 26,513 students logging in and checking out titles, while February 2021 had (a still impressive) 21,396 students.
You can download the full calendar year’s statistics .xlsx spreadsheet, which includes detailed information on circulation numbers, holds, and other metrics, broken down by month, at the bottom of the WSDLC Year to Date Statistics page.
Flipped Classroom: Purchasing
During the month of March, we’re taking a look at Purchasing! In this Flipped Classroom, you’ll get an inside look at how titles are selected and purchased for the Consortium, and you’ll also find more details on how to purchase titles for your Advantage account: learn how to build and manage carts, add content credit, adjust the content access level for your purchases, and read some tips and tricks on how to avoid accidentally purchasing titles more than once (when you don’t necessarily mean to)!
During our Flipped Classroom months, materials on various topics are available for members to review, and OverDrive staff is ready to schedule one-on-one 20-minute sessions to answer your questions. Please let us know if you have any questions or comments on the flipped classroom content; we’d love to hear what you’re thinking!
Watch Your Inboxes: WSDLC Board Nominations Are Sending Soon!
Very soon, we will be sending out a call to all WSDLC Member Representatives for nominations to be on the WSDLC Board! There are a number of seats coming up for election this year: CESA 1, CESA 4, CESA 6, CESA 7, CESA 10, CESA 11, CESA 12, and three At-Large seats.
If you are from a participating district and are your district’s WSDLC Member Representative*, please consider nominating yourself or a colleague!
*Each participating district has one designated Member Representative. This Member Representative will be eligible to vote and to be nominated to serve on the Board. The representative may be a library media specialist, curriculum expert, technology consultant, or administrator. If you aren’t sure who your district’s Member Representative is, or if you would like to designate someone else as your district’s Member Representative, reach out to the Project Managers at wsdlc-info@wils.org.
About the WSDLC Board: The WSDLC is governed by a Board consisting of members of the consortium and representatives from the partners (CESA Purchasing, CESA Statewide Network, DPI, and WILS). Each Board Member serves a three-year term, and there are no term limits. The WSDLC Board holds regular meetings 4-6 times per year, and all meetings are online. A total commitment of around 7 hours per year is expected.
You can find out more in the WSDLC Board Operational Guidelines.
Tips & Tricks From WSDLC Members & OverDrive
Don’t Forget: WSDLC’S Shared Collection Includes Magazines!
We know that many of you are assessing your collections and spending to prepare your 2022-23 budgets. After a great conversation recently with one of our Board Members, we’d like to remind all of you that the WSDLC subscribes to Sora’s collection of magazines that includes 60 titles! If you’re in a position where you need to make the difficult decision to trim your budget, take a peek at what’s available with your WSDLC membership; you may find some resources here that could replace other subscriptions.
OverDrive has also recently made available additional content via Sora Extras, which includes Method Learning and DOGO News, as well as a new Comic Books & Graphic Novels collection (which includes nearly 1,900 titles). We have received pricing for each of these for the consortium, and the WSDLC Board is assessing each alongside the WSDLC budget to decide which, if any, could be added this year. We are hopeful to have a decision at the next WSDLC Board meeting on Thursday March 24th, and will announce which of these items may become available soon.
Looking for ways to engage your students? Here are some tips from OverDrive Account Managers:
- Create a google form to capture students’ book requests!
- Create curations of popular titles that will hook students on reading
- Offer a variety of content: ebooks, comics, manga, audiobooks, magazines, etc
- Set up a Sora Showcase display in your library
- Hang up Sora flyers, handout Sora bookmarks, and post on social media with our free graphics and templates
- Host contests between schools or grade levels with prizes (you can view branch reporting usage data to determine winners)
- Check out School Stars and see the creative ways other schools have promoted Sora to their students
Thank You For Joining Us At WEMTA!
We had a wonderful turnout at our booth at WEMTA’s annual conference on Monday, March 8th! It was so great to see and meet so many of our members face-to-face, and to chat with folks from schools and districts who aren’t a part of the WSDLC yet but are hoping to be very soon!
Thank you to everyone who came out, and for those who attended Sara Gold’s WSDLC Update presentation on Zoom!
