(12 Nov 2020) News from New Zealand: The National Library and the Alexander Turnbull Library are preserving millions of online digital communications to create a snapshot of Aotearoa’s response to COVID-19. The collection includes online posts that are already within the public realm and donated material. Here is the full news with…
(22 Sept 2020) Papers Past is the National Library’s fully text searchable website containing over 150 newspapers from New Zealand and the Pacific, as well as magazines, journals and government reports. As a result of the data being released, people can now access the data from 78 New Zealand newspapers from the Albertland Gazette to…
(2 Sept 2020) With a lack of funding, space and staffing for school libraries in New Zealand, most are being forced to shut down. The School Library Association of New Zealand Aotearoa (SLANZA) is launching a nationwide campaign called ‘School Libraries Transform‘ to highlight the issue. Watch the video for more information about the…
(19 Aug 2020) The head of Selwyn District Council’s libraries, Nicki Moen, said during the lockdown their library was one of many which dropped overdue fines, and the council had now been given the backing to continue that for a two-year trial. She said she hoped it would encourage more people to make use of…
(10 Aug 2020) A new role of New Zealand Reading Ambassador for children and young people was announced by Prime Minister and Minister for Arts, Culture and Heritage Jacinda Ardern, and Internal Affairs Minister Tracey Martin, at a Celebration of Reading Event at the National Library in Wellington on 5 August. The Reading Ambassador role,…
(21 Jul 2020) Wellingtonians are being given five options for the future of their library, but the city council has expressed a preference for high-level earthquake strengthening. A consultation document which will go public on 27 July was finalised today at a City Council meeting. The preferred option has a projected cost of between $174.4m…
(27 May 2020) From New Zealand: A major funding package for libraries will allow them to play a far greater role in supporting their communities and people seeking jobs as part of the economic recovery from COVID-19. “Budget 2020 contains over $60 million of funding to protect library services and to protect jobs,” says Internal…
(15 May 2020) From “Justin the Librarian” blog: Our library had been planning what this eventual reopening would look like for the entire time that New Zealand was in Pandemic Alert Levels 3 & 4. There were many meetings and discussions around what reopening could look like and all angles and ideas were heard, considered,…
(6 Apr 2020) On April 3, Arlington Public Library published the first issue of Quaranzine, a weekly online collection of works by local artists responding to the coronavirus pandemic. “Creative expression is a really valuable tool I have for working through my own thought processes and anxiety,” says Laribee, who is also a portrait artist.…
(4 Apr 2020) The day before New Zealand entered a four-week lockdown to prevent the spread of coronavirus, Auckland Libraries recorded its highest number of online memberships seen in a single day since the service began in October. The libraries normally averages 64 new eMemberships a day, but last Wednesday 200 Aucklanders joined to access eBooks, audiobooks, streaming files and online databases,…