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Upcoming Training and Upgrade Sessions in November and December

Evergreen, Training

Training sessions in November and December:
(Online via Zoom)

November 19, 2 – 3 PM: List Maker: Making Bookbags of Selected Titles
Learn to use the List Maker to create a list of titles in the bookbag format, which you can share with patrons to make it easy for them to select titles, see what’s available, and place holds. This is a great way to create a list that matches titles from a book display, award list titles, staff picks, or titles related to any season, event or theme.    Here’s an example of the bookbag format: Snowy Days
Registration

November 21, 10 – 11 AM: Meet Me at the Corner of Cat and Circ
How does the system decide how much to bill a patron for lost material?  Why do we get so many alerts at the circ desk (or why don’t we get more?)  What does Age Hold Protection mean, and how is it set up?  What happens to missing and lost items — do they stay in the system forever?  How do parts work?  This session reviews how library loan rules work, and which elements of cataloging affect how circulation works.  It is aimed at both circulation and cataloging staff (especially the designated representatives) and administrators.
Registration

December 3, 10 – 11 AM: Making Most Popular Books Lists
Learn how to use circulation data to create lists of the books, DVDs, etc., that circulated the most for your library, in the past year (or any time period.) These can be as general as adult fiction, as specific as cookbooks or can be lists of the most popular authors based on the checkouts of their titles. 
Registration

December 5, 10 – 11 AM: Gemini AI: Hands-On Workshop
Gemini AI is Google’s artificial intelligence chatbot, available to everyone with a Google Workspace account at https://gemini.google.com. In this session, you’ll learn how Gemini (and other AI chatbots) “think” and what kind of tasks they can do as we work together through guided exercises and sharing screens.
Registration

Evergreen Upgrade Sessions:
(Online via Zoom)

NOBLE is upgrading to Evergreen 3.13 on Sunday, January 5. In these upgrade sessions, NOBLE staff will share the details of the downtime and provide an overview of new features to expect in the next release. Please bring along any questions you may have about the upcoming upgrade.
(Online via Zoom)

December 11, 10 -11 AM: Registration
December 17, 2 – 3 PM: Registration

Nice to meet you, NOBLE!

NOBLE

I would like to take a moment to introduce myself on my first day at NOBLE!

My name is Gabriel Jayroe (he/him) and I am coming on as the new Member Services Support Associate. I’ve worked in the NOBLE Library system for almost 8 years, starting at the Peabody Institute Library Main Branch and making my way to the West Branch Assistant Librarian.

I am incredibly excited to start this position that will let me support libraries and their users. I’ve been a library user since infancy and I hope my work helps to create inclusive and accessible spaces for people of all backgrounds. Some of my library passions are inclusive and diverse materials and ease of access for marginalized communities.

When I’m not at work,  I live in Salem and like to spend time with my partner going to concerts, karaoke, art festivals, and old record shops. In my downtime I write poetry for literature journals, make art, and play video games.

I’m very excited to begin this new chapter in library services and I look forward to supporting all of you!

Summer Training Schedule

Training

We have several training sessions coming up this summer on Evergreen, List Maker, Google Workspace and OverDrive. All are online via Zoom, will be recorded and will be repeated in the fall.

You can see the full list, divided by topic and with registration links, on this document:
NOBLE Training Schedule

If you prefer a chronological view, you can see the training sessions as well as other meetings and events on the Staff Information System Calendar

Upcoming Evergreen 3.12 Upgrade – June 11

Evergreen, Executive Director's Report

NOBLE is pleased to announce the network is upgrading to Evergreen release 3.12 overnight on Tuesday, June 11.

Downtime Information

  • The tentative upgrade window is Tuesday June 11 between 9:00 pm and 12:00 am.
  • We will add messaging to the public catalog 1 week prior to the upgrade.
  • This upgrade will be much smaller than our previous one back in January. Because of the timing and reduced actual database downtime, we will not be building a backup authentication server.
  • During the downtime window, the following will be unavailable:
    • Circulation and other staff functions
    • Web catalog
    • Patron self services like placing holds, renewals and signing up for ecards
    • Authentication via SIP2 (Overdrive, selfcheck, Hoopla, museum pass, EZproxy etc.) will be unavailable for a portion of the upgrade window.

Previewing 3.12

NOBLE staff can log into the training system to get a first-hand look at release 3.12, which we will be using for training and testing the new release. Here’s how to login and set search preferences for the old and new versions of the staff catalog: Logging Into the Training System.

  • Please let us know if there are newer staff who can’t access the training system so we can add their accounts.
  • The training system contains a snapshot of NOBLE data so there are holds, overdue, bills, etc., with all patron information anonymized.
  • Feel free to test things, including adding, editing or removing patron, title or item information. Anything you add or change will be gone the next time we update the snapshot for the training system. Nothing will transfer to the production (live) system.

What’s Coming in Release 3.12 And Beyond (presentation)
Evergreen Release 3.12 Upgrade Session (recording)

 

NOBLE Endorses Joint Statement on Intellectual Freedom and Censorship

Challenged Materials, Executive Board

The NOBLE Executive Board unanimously voted to endorse the Joint Statement on Intellectual Freedom and Censorship issued by the Massachusetts Board of Library Commissioners (MBLC), the Massachusetts Library System (MLS), the Massachusetts Library Association (MLA), and the Massachusetts School Library Association (MSLA).

As the statement reads: “Attacks on members of our communities, targeted at marginalized peoples, are more than book challenges. They are acts of intolerance and exclusion intended to silence diverse voices and views, while holding fast to homogenous viewpoints by historically dominant voices. These acts jeopardize everyone’s access to learn from different perspectives and limit the opportunities available for those isolated in their experience to realize they are not alone.”