Tonight our library hosted Harry Potter Book Night, part of a nationwide night of celebration of the series. The program was originally thought up by my youth services partner Sara, and worked on by several members of our staff. We set it up as stations throughout the library, mostly in out collaboration space called THINKspot and the Children's Room.
Stations included "potion" making (tasty juice and soda with food coloring), wand painting, "howler" paper crafts, sorting kids into their houses, and a costume contest. I had limited involvement with a lot of the planning, so I'll let my coworkers report on the specifics on their blogs if they wish. However, I was free and able to travel downtown to the Arizona Midday studio to appear on a segment promoting Harry Potter Book Night to the whole valley. So, I am famous again!
I am not able to embed the video, but it is immortalized forever on the Arizona Midday website.
Visiting the TV studio was a surreal experience. The closest thing I've experienced in the past is a recording studio as a kid. Everything was on platforms, which were themselves on wheels, and nothing was as sturdy as it looked.
The studio from my perch in the waiting area
My shooting location with my props on the table
Teleprompter
Me and the host after shooting the segment
This is a video showing how to make the Howler craft. It isn't nearly as complicated as it looks.
This is an example of the wands. Basically, you make a design with hot glue on the fat end of a chopstick and let it dry, then paint over it.
Also, our local newspaper Nearby News stopped by for the event and ran this short feature on it.
The program itself went great with over 100 people in attendance. Harry Potter is always a slam dunk!
Just kidding, I am in no way famous. I did, however, get to be on the local news as a library representative earlier this morning.
The local organization Grand Canyon State Model Railroaders have been at our library with a giant HO Scale model train exhibit since Wednesday, and they will be here until the end of the week. The exhibit is pretty amazing. It takes up our entire program room, which has a capacity of over 300 people. All the models are handmade by members of the group, and each is based on a different town with an interesting history. The train cars themselves are one 68th to scale of a real train, meaning it would take 68 of the models to make up one life size train car. The speed they travel around the track is also to scale, which is an interesting tidbit I learned while preparing for my interview.
These are a couple pictures I got from their Facebook page. Click the link above to visit their page and see some cool videos of the trains in action!
In preparation for my interview, I worked with our marketing team to come up with some reasons we wanted to have trains at the library.
Multi-generational programming: Trains are nostalgic for a lot of people, and interesting to people of all ages. This exhibit is something all members of the family can enjoy and discuss.
STEM: Science, technology, engineering, and math.
There are quantifiable physics involved with the way trains move on the tracks.
Evolution of the technology of trains over the decades.
Math of figuring out accurate scale of models to life size trains.
History: Each handmade model is based on a real historical town.
Community engagement: Getting people into the library who wouldn't usually come, or who have never been before.
The library supports engagement hobbies such as making scale models as part of lifelong learning.
Of course, I didn't actually get to use any of these great talking points in my interviews. They just wanted the bare bones from me: We are excited to have the trains here, everything is free, and it's running all week until Saturday.
The first video does not include me, but has some great information from one of the Grand Canyon Model Railroaders about the exhibit.
Here are my two big exciting interviews, that are definitely not filmed with iPhone cameras straight off the TV (Just kidding, they are):
(1 more video to come)
Later in the day, Channel 10 also came and interviewed a different member of the group.
Overall, facilitating media visits and being interviewed for the news was a really cool experience. I didn't stumble over my words nearly as much as I thought I would, even though it was 5:00 in the morning and I had had roughly an hour to memorize my talking points. I felt really excited to be representing the library, and the city, on the TV news. Sometimes I feel like a door-to-door salesman or religious zealot trying to spread the good word of the public library, but I'm so psyched every time I get to tell more people about it! I know the news spots were really more about the train exhibits than the library, but even so, a bunch of people will probably visit the library who might have never been in before. That's what library programming is all about!
In closing, here is a selfie I took with the camera guy, Brett, and the reporter, John.
