MyWiLS Orientation Toolkits for Academic and K12 Libraries
Are you new to your school or academic library position? The WiLS Cooperative Purchasing team can ease your transition with the MyWiLS Orientation Toolkits for library media specialists and for academic library staff!

The Toolkits, specifically designed for your type of library, are there to help you document your subscription information – URLs and access information, usage stats, invoicing preferences, and communications from WiLS – to make staff transitions easier and ensure uninterrupted access to your resources. In addition, it provides information on our partners and other valuable resources.

New Vendor Partners and Products for You!
We’ve been hard at work building relationships with new vendors and partners to broaden the array of resources available to you and your community: TALK (Text and Learn for Kindergarten), Ingram Library Services, WT Cox, Library Chef, ConnectWell, Outgrow Your Garage, and Lingopie. Visit the links to learn more about each new vendor and their products.

Got Your Eye on Something New?
Are there vendors you’d like to see WiLS Cooperative Purchasing work with? Are there new products that you’d like to purchase for your library? We are always open to your ideas! Fill out this brief form and we will follow up.

Please contact the WiLS Cooperative Purchasing team at coop@wils.org to schedule an orientation meeting or with any questions. We are here to help!

Custom Strategic Plan Development
We’ve worked with library systems and libraries large and small in Wisconsin (and now Pennsylvania!) to develop custom strategic plans. We offer a flexible framework that relies on data collection to help make the best decisions and is rooted in the belief that the library is important to its community and its community is important to the library. We listen to what you need and work with you to make it happen within your budget. If you would like more information, contact Melissa McLimans at melissa@wils.org.

Data and Research Services
Whether it’s a deep look at your service numbers, a survey to understand community needs, or general research and data analysis, WiLS can provide the answers you need. We offer on-demand visualizations of dozens of Annual Report metrics and basic community demographic data with the Data Dashboards for Public Libraries. Also, we just launched the WiLS Data Classroom, an opportunity to learn practical data skills specifically for public libraries and with public library peers. With a data analyst on staff and over a decade of experience in library research projects, our warm and approachable team will craft the best process for you. Contact Kim Kiesewetter at kim@wils.org for more details.

Small Library Strategic Planning Cohort
A strategic plan helps libraries make decisions, big and small, and every library should be able to afford a strategic plan. Each year, we offer an opportunity for a cohort of public libraries in small communities (5,000 people or fewer) to learn about their community’s needs and aspirations and use them to craft strategic directions for the next 3-5 years. The next application period opens in the summer of 2025. If you have any questions, contact Laura Damon-Moore at laura@wils.org.

In September, we announced the 2024 recipients of WiLS’ Ideas to Action Fund:

• Greenfield Public Library, Adaptive Story Time Expansion: Inclusive Story Sessions for All Ages and Abilities
• McIntosh Memorial Library, Culinary Literacy Mobile Demonstration Kitchen
• Milwaukee Public Library, Library Entrepreneur-in-Residence
• Northwoods Community Elementary School at Rhinelander School District, Sewing Seeds in the Library and Beyond
• Sokaogon Chippewa Community, Welcome To The 21st Century: Digitizing Tribal Analog History
• Somerset Public Library, Echoes of the Past: Revitalizing Community Heritage Through an Immersive Audio History Tour
• UW-Eau Claire McIntyre Library, Blugold Makerspace Eau Claire Repair Fair
• UW-Parkside Library, Invertebrate Insights: Community-Driven Collection and Education Initiative
• West Bend Public Library, Grow, Cook, Save: A Journey to Food Economy and Healthy Eating

You can read more about these projects here.

If you are interested in applying for up to $5000 toward a project for your library or cultural organization, the 2025 Ideas to Action application period will open in April!

Taco Tuesdays in November
We’ve doubled the taco helpings! Join WiLS and WiLS members for 15-minute vendor presentations on Tuesdays twice each month. Here’s what’s coming up:

Visit the Taco Tuesday website to see all upcoming editions.

Save the date for the WiLS 2024 Member Meeting
Join us on Friday, February 28th at 10:00 am CT for our next Member Meeting to learn what our members and our staff have been up to – and what’s ahead!

Recollection Wisconsin Digitization Initiative
The first Recollection Wisconsin Digitization Initiative cohort started in September! This initiative brings together Wisconsin content partners and information school graduate students to create new digital collections. Content partners will choose collections to digitize, and student staff will handle the digitization and metadata work as part of a paid practicum or independent study experience. Most digitized collections will be added to Recollection Wisconsin. Program expenses for student stipends, travel, and training are paid by Recollection Wisconsin with no cost to the host sites. 

Interested in being considered as a host site for a student in Spring or Summer 2025? Find more information for potential content partners and how to apply on the Recollection Wisconsin website.

Recollection Wisconsin Goes Fee-Free!
Recollection Wisconsin has made the significant decision to eliminate all onboarding fees, hosting fees, and harvesting fees for all incoming and current content partners. This move is a leap toward increased accessibility and showcases our commitment to fostering a collaborative and inclusive digital collections platform. The decision is also aligned with Recollection Wisconsin’s work in amplifying collections that reflect the full spectrum of Wisconsin’s cultural heritage.

Read more about this decision on the Recollection Wisconsin blog.

A Mission and a Vision
In September, the governing bodies of Recollection Wisconsin unveiled Recollection Wisconsin’s first mission and vision statements.

Mission: Recollection Wisconsin connects cultural heritage institutions
statewide to preserve, promote, and facilitate digital access to Wisconsin’s rich history through collaboration and shared infrastructure.

Vision: Recollection Wisconsin envisions a connected future preserving all voices through the visibility and exploration of the rich and complex history of our state.

While the consortium has been living the ideals laid out in these statements since its inception as Wisconsin Heritage Online many years ago, Recollection Wisconsin is grateful for these words to help guide our work.

Digital Readiness Toolkit
Recollection Wisconsin’s Digital Readiness Toolkit, available as an ebook or a PDF, continues to help organizations of all sizes build and tend to their digital collections. This one-stop resource provides guidance on each stage of a digitization project: Planning and prioritization, Permissions and copyright, Digitization, Description, Sharing and access, Storage and maintenance, and Evaluation.

Keeping Membership Costs Affordable and Content Quality High
At $1.65 per student, WSDLC membership is a very affordable way for your students to access over 110,000 copies of 23,000 unique titles of ebooks, digital audiobooks, magazines, and comic books in three collections based on students’ grade levels. The WSDLC allows districts of any size to access an extensive digital library and is committed to keeping membership costs affordable. The WSDLC membership year runs from September 1st to August 31st, and schools can join at any time at a prorated cost.

Meeting Members Where They Are With New Features in Sora
As collection usage accelerates – we reached 5 million lifetime checkouts in January and 6 million in September! – exciting new features in Sora are enhancing the WSDLC collections.

Expanded Content Leveling: The materials available in Sora are now sorted into five collections, instead of three, which makes it easier for schools to allow their students access to digital titles that better fit their interests and district policies. The Elementary collection is now divided into Lower and Upper Elementary; the High School collection is now divided into Lower and Upper High School.

Curated Collections: A dedicated Digital Content Librarian at OverDrive regularly creates curated collections so students can quicky and easily find what interests them. These curated collections include standards like new and popular titles, but also thematic and Wisconsin-specific curations, such as collections to support WEMTA’s Battle of the Books, a Wisconsin’s First Nations Booklist, and a collection that highlights Deaf Awareness Month.

Easier Ordering: It can be difficult to find the time to not only identify titles to purchase, but to then buy them in OverDrive’s shopping portal. Now, schools can let the WSDLC team create purchase lists for them! Every three months, the WSDLC team OverDrive identifies the titles with the most holds on them and creates packages based on content levels. WSDLC member schools can then submit a Google Form to indicate which packages they’d like to purchase. No logging into portals and no running reports and building carts – just a straightforward way to get the most popular titles into students’ hands faster.

Wisconsin’s Digital Library Resources
The WPLC Digital Library Marketing Committee has been hard at work creating a set of resources to help libraries and library systems promote Wisconsin’s Digital Library to their communities. The resources include press release templates, print materials, graphics and more!

The Did You Know? series spotlights features, tools, and other resources available to library staff, including patron-facing folks, to expand their know-how about Wisconsin’s Digital Library, OverDrive, Libby, and the Wisconsin Public Library Consortium (WPLC). Check the series out on the WPLC Blog!

WPLC Technology Collaboration
In partnership with the Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction (DPI), the WPLC is facilitating a statewide data dashboard pilot from September 3-December 31, 2024. During the dashboard pilot, all public library and system staff from across the state will have barrier-free access to a statewide dashboard composed primarily of public library service data as gathered in Wisconsin’s Annual Report. You can access the dashboard on the WPLC website at: https://wplc.info/dashboard. No login credentials are needed!

The Technology Backup and Digital Archive Backup Collaboration are two projects that work to provide a backup storage platform for systems. The two workgroups governing these projects have been diligently monitoring this critical service and onboarding new systems to the platforms. Resources on the Digital Archival Storage process can be found on the WPLC website.

Statewide Delivery
The WPLC recently took a governance role over the statewide library delivery service. A new workgroup was formed that is charged with budget and policy recommendations, as well as daily operational decisions related to statewide intersystem delivery. 

Exploring Library Experience Options
This year, WISPALS underwent an extensive ILS exploration process. A Request for Information (RFI) was developed and issued to several identified vendors and products. Throughout the winter and spring, WISPALS members reviewed vendor demos, evaluated products, and participated in multiple discussions to identify the most suitable solution at the best price that will provide the best possible service to each institution’s students, faculty, staff, and community. In June 2024, WISPALS elected to migrate from Innovative’s Sierra to OCLC’s WorldShare Management Services. Migration will take place over the next year, with a launch goal of July 2025. 

Improved Web Presence
WISPALS revamped the consortium website, giving it a new look and feel and reviewing and updating all the content. This website is used to draw attention to the work that WISPALS is doing with stakeholders and peer organizations, including other libraries and consortia. It is also used to introduce potential new consortium members to WISPALS’ work.