Library Corner

Term 2 in the Library

We can’t believe how quickly this term has flown by! The library has been busy with classes and other activities, and continues to be a hub of the school.

We recently celebrated Library & Information Week along with many other libraries throughout Australia. The theme this year was “Find Yourself in a Library” and we hosted two events in the library - a Treasure Hunt where students followed clues around to discover a hidden message (YOUR LIBRARY LOVES YOU!) and our first ever Library Open Mic where students were given 100 words to respond to the question: How did you find yourself in a library? Our spoken word experts Ms Douglas and Ms Schmidtke judged the performances, and after much deliberation, awarded runner-up to Adelin Zipman (Year 10), and first place to Freya Matthews (Year 7). The audience was in awe of each brave student who got up to speak, so congratulations to them all! We also co-hosted a Zine Workshop with the art department as a part of Arts & Technology week (which ran at the same time as Library & Information Week). The workshop was so popular that students have requested we start a zine club at school. Stay tuned!

As always, we continued to commemorate a number of local and international events in the library with competitions, screenings and book displays. Most recently that has included National Reconciliation Week and International Day Against Homophobia and Transphobia (IDAHOT). We have many incredible resources that tie into these events, and are happy to report that when they go out on display at the front of the library, they are most likely borrowed by our staff and students! Our current display is a winter reading theme, with snowy white book covers that make us feel a bit cold just looking at them!

Exam time is nearly here, and we encourage senior students to use the library as a space to study, as well as a “de-stress zone” should they need to take some time out. As well as our collection of study guides for each VCE subject, we have plenty of books that can help students improve their study skills and stay clear-headed during exam time, such as VCE Survival Guide, Smashing VCE: How to study and still have a life, and If You Want To Blitz Your Year 12 Exams Read This Book.

Homework Help continues to run every Tuesday and Wednesday from 3.15pm-4.30pm, and there are a number of volunteer tutors that are available to help with subjects in all year levels.

In exciting news, we are working closely with the IT department to get our library catalogue Accessit available from outside of school. That means students will be able to use the library 24/7 to search for books, renew their loans, write book reviews and utilise our extensive digital resources.

Finally, we announced our biannual Book Review prizes last week. Congratulations to Georgia Wood-Freeman (Year 9) for writing the most reviews this semester (56!) and also to Manasvi Shirgaonkar (Year 8) and Leo Bizas (Year 7) who have written the best reviews as judged by the library staff. These students were awarded book vouchers so they can buy some brand new books to add to their own libraries!

Winter holidays are just around the corner, and we hope you find the time to get warm and cosy with a great book!

Karys McEwen College Librarian & Megan Gatt Library Technician