Throughout May we are celebrating Women’s Health Week at the library by focusing on a basic need of many. There are people in our community unable to go to work or attend school because they don’t have the money to buy period supplies. This affects their mental well-being, their earning potential and their opportunity to learn.

Your local public library provides you with services to help bridge the digital gap. At the library, we often help patrons who have never used a computer apply for jobs or set up a laptop for the first time. Others have come in to get help building their résumés, to practice their keyboarding skills and to learn how to use their smartphones or tablets. Take advantage of the digital services at the libraries in Ashland, Columbia, Fulton and Holts Summit.

If you’re looking for fun active learning projects for kids, the library’s new online resource, Lerner Maker Lab, will give you all kinds of ideas. You’ll discover easy crafts, kid-friendly recipes, engaging experiments, simple building plans and fun party projects.

Who doesn’t love spring — the time of year when nature brings us renewal, warm fresh air and the opportunity to get outside and enjoy the sunshine? For me, spring also brings a reminder of our stewardship of the Earth. Here at the Daniel Boone Regional Library, we take our stewardship of public library resources seriously, not just in the materials and services we provide, but also in our four facilities.

The One Read reading panel of community members from Boone and Callaway Counties narrowed the list of more than 200 book suggestions for the 2023 One Read title to two top contenders. Between April 10-28, the public can cast their vote for either “When Two Feathers Fell From the Sky” by Margaret Verble or “Why Fish Don’t Exist: A Story of Loss, Love, and the Hidden Order of Life” by Lulu Miller.

LOTE4Kids (Languages Other Than English) has introduced sign language kids books into their collection of languages. You’ll now find picture books in American (ASL), Australian (Auslan), and British (BSL) sign languages as well as more bilingual and read-along stories and downloadable activities.

OverDrive has announced that their legacy app for Android and iOS devices will be discontinued at the end of April. This means if you’ve been using the OverDrive app for accessing eBooks, digital audiobooks and magazines, you will need to switch to the replacement Libby app.

Next week, you’ll notice some updates to the library’s homepage. The top navigation and search function will remain the same, but the rest will look refreshed. To make it easier for you to find what you’re looking for, we’ve established standing sections for different topics of interest to you.

This winter, we asked patrons of all ages to design a new book cover based on a book that reminds them to take care. Congratulations to our winners! These folks drew, painted, and colored designs to celebrate this year’s Winter Reading theme, “Take Time to Take Care.”

To improve their services, libraries, along with the rest of society, have embraced evolving technologies over the last century. If a time machine took us back to 1922, we could visit the Columbia Public Library, but we would miss the view from the Quiet Reading Room on the third floor and the convenience of the self-check stations in the current building. We would also miss our digital devices that connect us to the online library catalog, streaming Kanopy movies and all of the other things you love to do through the library’s website.