Posts by Staff

The Vinita library “Bookworm Walk” is open! A map is available at the Library and will be posted on the library’s Facebook page. The Bookworm Walk is a new fun and exciting way for children and families to experience the joys of reading together in the great outdoors. It begins at the library and following the signs, it ends in South Park.

Use the map for the Bookwalk. You can pick up a map at the library or find it on our Facebook page. We hope the community enjoys this event going on through July and August. Send us pictures on our Facebook page or by email atlibrary@cityofvinita.com to be entered into a drawing for a free copy of “Town Mouse Country Mouse” by Jan Brett.

The Oklahoma Virtual Library is once again the beneficiary of grant funds through the Institute of Museum and Library Services provided by the Oklahoma Department of Libraries. Money received in September has allowed library patrons who rely on digital access for books, audios, and magazines to receive an influx of new titles.

Older magazine subscriptions expired in July, and new issues had not been available until now. Libraries were able to subscribe to a total of 35 magazines using grant funds. New titles not previously available include “The Economist,” “The Pioneer Woman,” “Rolling Stone,” The New Yorker,” “Bon Appetit,” and many others. Old favorites such as “Us Weekly,” “Reader’s Digest” and “Prevention” are still available.

To see a complete list, you can go to OK Virtual Magazines. All magazines are available for immediate download, and there is never a wait.

The children’s collection expanded by 1,885 volumes. Several of these were new titles, but many were replacements for expired copies. Due to publisher restrictions, most eBooks do not stay in the virtual library permanently, and patrons had holds on hundreds of titles that had expired. Grant funds have allowed libraries to lessen this backlog of demand while also adding fresh, new titles.

Keeping up with children’s demand is extremely important as so many are attending online school at this time. Children’s checkouts for all libraries belonging to the OK Virtual Library increased from 10,170 in September 2019 to 15,635 in September 2020. Some individual libraries doubled their children’s checkouts from the year before. While young adult checkouts saw a slight increase from 8,510 to 8,633, adult checkouts also increased substantially like children’s from 72,689 last year to 77,214 during September. Grant funds added 1,775 volumes to the adult and young adult collections.

In addition to new titles to try, OverDrive has added features on the Libby app. Readers can now easily share and recommend what they are reading on social media and save a copy of their reading history. These are accessible from users’ timelines in the app. To share a title once they have finished, users click on the title in their timeline, then click on “Reading Journey.” The “Actions” button will let users export reading data, or share the title. Users who want to save a list of their reading history should click on “See your timeline” at the bottom of their shelf, then click “Actions” to export their timeline.

For readers who use the OK Virtual Library out of convenience, necessity, or to keep safe right now, there are new titles and less waiting times for many people. Thank you to the Oklahoma Department of Libraries for making this possible!