• How to Launch TLM on Your Campus

• How to Hold a Reception Celebrating TLM

• How to Make Your Users Feel Welcome in Your Library During TLM

• How to Mount a Rare Document and Books Display

• How to Find Out What Users Think of the Library

• Profiles of the Patron Saint(s)

• Your Suggestions

Internal Preparation:

a. Contact all ATLA members on campus, including student members.

b. Introduce all staff to Theological Libraries Month, the overall goal, and the TLM tagline:  Information Central.

c. Add TLM copy to your email signature:

 Theological Libraries Month:
October 2008
Information Central

d. Review your list of services and recast it to emphasize the benefits to your users, for example:

• Your theological library can simplify your information searches.
• Your TL can help you find the specialized materials you need.
• Your TL can show you how to research better, faster.

For a full description of how to highlight the ways  your services benefit your users, consult the ALA document, Strategic Marketing for Academic and Research Libraries, Participant Manual.

e. Brainstorm innovative ways to meet users’ needs during TLM.

• Consider Adding Podcasts to Your Services
• If you don’t already, consider offering 24/7 on-line messaging access during TLM

Going Public:

 a. Put the TLM logo on your library’s home page and, if possible, on your  institution’s home page (with a link to your library’s home page).

• If you will be observing TLM with special activities, link to information about those
• Add the TLM logo to whatever you are currently doing to promote your library on campus

b. Create a special print TLM poster or flyer for your library, to include:

  c. Publicize TLM on campus and in your University’s community:

• Customize the sample newsletter article so that it describes your library’s observance of TLM.
• Contact the University’s public relations office; they may want to publicize TLM in your community or with your University’s audiences.
• Contact the alumni office; they may want to reference TLM in their communications or their fundraising.
• Contact student publications and then send them a press release.

d.  Keep Track

• Keep a list of your TLM promotional activities.
• Set up a simple system for tracking TLM-related interactions with users, particularly those you can trace back to your promotional activities.

The main purpose of any reception you hold as part of TLM is to raise awareness of your library, its staff, and the services you offer with a targeted group of  people.

You can keep it simple.

Here is a basic checklist you can use to organize the event:

1. Whom do you want to have attend?

2. What kind of invitation will get their attention? How will they RSVP?

• Personal call
• Email
• Written invitation
• Special invitation such as a puzzle or a game or an invitation to a scavenger hunt in the library or online.

3. How will you structure the time?

• Date near the beginning of TLM.
• At what time will it begin? End?
• Formal program?
• Informal activities available?

 4. What will you serve?

• Liquid and food refreshments (keyed to timing).
• If you don’t have a budget for food, how can you still offer some sort of refreshments? Staff contributions?
• Can the refreshments be used to introduce a new food policy for the library?
• For more information:  Planning Special Events: Blueprint For Success by Debora Meskauskas.

1.  Introduce Staff as Individuals

• Publish a photo album of staff, including brief descriptions of what they do to serve library’s patrons.
• Create humorous name tags for all staff - Take a cue from the tech industry and create fanciful titles (e.g., Information Diva).
• Exchange names with users at the beginning of any significant interaction.
• Post consultation hours when users can reserve a specific time slot with a librarian (both in person and remotely).

2.  Introduce or Reintroduce the Library to Students

• Be part of new student orientations.
• Hold special TLM small group orientations for current students, inviting them by email and perhaps giving attendees a TLM premium (e.g. lanyards for cards).

3. Introduce or Reintroduce the Library to Faculty

The main goal here is to establish the Library’s role as an education center on campus that supports and enhances their own. One way to do this is to explain the value of special collections for teaching and not only for scholarly research. 

To get the message across during TLM, you might:

• Hold a new faculty orientation.
• Offer to make a short, customized, presentation on “what’s new this year that you can use in your classes” at several departmental meetings.

4. Meet with Administration to Explore the Library’s Value to Your University

For each of the following, you will have to decide who in the administration would be most appropriate. Instead of setting up a formal meeting, you might try setting up a lunch or coffee, or even an early evening drink.           

• Develop a “talking points” list of the five most important ways your library adds value to your institution.
•     Offer to play a central leadership role in the school’s overall records management program. 
• Talk about what the library might contribute to the institution’s activities in licensing intellectual property.
• In preparation, you might want to take a few minutes to read through the Association of College and Research Libraries document, “The Power of Personal Persuasion: Advancing the Academic Library Agenda from the Front Lines".

5. Acknowledge Repeat Users by Name

Train staff in techniques for remembering names 

As you know, old books and documents exude romance and attract attention, particularly when they are rare or related to the history of your institution. If October is when your institution hosts homecoming or alumni reunions, the time is ripe.

Adapt ACRL’s “A Student’s Guide to Evaluating Libraries in Colleges and Universities”  

• Make this report card available throughout the month (hard copy and on-line).

• Use the results to stimulate discussion internally within the library and externally with the administration.

• Establish a user “advisory panel.”

• Solicit and incent ongoing feedback with some sort of humorous premium, e.g., a sticker that says, “I told them what I thought!” and your library name.

Jerome (September 30)

a link to the (Episcopal lectionary) readings and prayers for St. Jerome.

A good profile can be found in Lesser Feasts and Fasts (published by the Episcopal Church; not available full-text online anywhere, since the ECUSA wants you buy the book!).  Here also is a link to his entry in the Catholic Encyclopedia and one at another RC site.
[Submitted by Jennifer Woodruff Tait]

Catherine of Alexandria ( November 25)

St. Catherine:  a link to the Orthodox Church in America's profile and scripture readings for Catherine of Alexandria (she's not in the Episcopal calendar and no longer in the Catholic one:).
[Submitted by Jennifer Woodruff Tait]

Although it is true that Catherine was officially delisted by the Vatican in 1961 for lack of historic evidence, the New Roman Missal says that she was reinstated into the calendar in 2002.
[Update submitted by Luba V. Zakharov]

St. Lawrence (August 10)

St. Lawrence is recognized as the patron saint of libraries in Europe
Link 1
Link 2
Link 3
Link 4

St. Wiborada (May 2)

St. Wiborada is recognized as the patron saint of libraries in Switzerland.
Link 1
Link 2
Link 3
[submitted by Michelle Y. Spomer]

What are you doing that you want to share? Submit your ideas here and we’ll post them, with thanks, for all to see.