December 28th, 2009 evanced
Happy Holidays everyone! We hope that the season is treating you well and that you’ve had a bit of time to relax. As you ease out of the food and sugar coma you’ve been enjoying the last several weeks, it’s time to start thinking about programs for 2010.
This post is going to focus on interesting or wacky holidays happening over the next six months. These are the holidays you might not get a reminder from ALA about or might not consider for a potential program!
January – aka National Thank You Month
January 23 – National Handwriting Day
January 23 – National Pie Day
January 26 – Australia Day
February – aka American Heart Month
February 2 – Groundhog Day
February 4 – National Girls and Women in Sport Day
February 8 – Boy Scouts Day
February 21 – Single-Tasking Day
February 22 – Academy Awards
We’re ready for our close-up, Mr. Deville!
February 26 – For Pete’s Sake Day
A day dedicated to wondering “Who the heck is Pete, anyways?”
February 28 – Floral Design Day
March – aka National Nutrition Month
March 2 – Fun Facts About Names Day
March 7 – Genealogy Day
March 16 – Black Press Day
A great opportunity to learn about the impact of African-American writers in the media
March 19 – Absolutely Incredible Kid Day
March 20 – Great American MeatOut
A day focusing on the benefits of vegetarianism
March 24 – American Diabetes Association Alert Day
March 31 – Bunsen Burner Day
Not to knock the greatness of the Bunsen Burner, but I can’t really imagine what
celebrating this holiday would involve.
April
April 2 – International Children’s Book Day
April 7 – No Housework Day
I am a huge supporter of this particular day. This should be a national holiday.
April 11 – Baby Massage Day
April 16 – National High Five Day
April 18 – National Adult Autism Awareness Day
April 24 – Global Youth Services Day
April 29 – National Dance Day
May – aka National Egg Month
May 1 – Save the Rhino Day
May 4 – National Teachers Day
May 6 – Beverage Day
May 10 – Peace Day
May 12 – International Nurses Day
May 13 – International Librarians Day
Just kidding, but that would be really interesting, wouldn’t it?
May 13 – Tulip Day
May 14 – National Chicken Dance Day
Because we all need a little more Chicken Dance in our lives…
May 15 – Armed Forces Day
May 20 – Flower Day
May 24 – National Escargot Day
May 30 – The Bucket’s Got A Hole In It Day
Teach kids how to sing “There’s a hole in the bucket…” as a program and then send them
home. Their parents will thank you, I’m quite certain.
June – Featuring National Shampoo Week, June 7-13
June 1 – International Children’s Day
June 2 – National Day of Italy
June 6 – Doo-Dah Day
I have no clue what this day is about. I found it on a calendar. Let me know what you make
up!!!
June 8 – Upsy-Daisy Day
June 19 – World Sauntering Day
We just don’t saunter like we used to, do we? A little relaxed, slow walking would be good
for us…
June 30 – Meteor Day
Let me know if you have any other fun ideas! And definitely let me know if you choose to build any programs for the days above!
Happy New Year -
Christine Ayar
Coordinator of Customer Experience
cayar@evancedsolutions.com
December 21st, 2009 evanced
We get a lot of positive emails from customers telling us how much they love us and our products. We really appreciate it and all the kind words make us a very happy software company.
So, for the holidays (whatever holiday might be most important to you) we’d like to introduce:
The “We Love Evanced!” Video Competition!
Here’s the short synopsis:
You, your library staff, or folks you know that use our products a lot and love them, create a 3-5 minute video using a free 30-day trial of Camtasia Studio from TechSmith. Use the video to tell what you love about Evanced, our products, our adorable staff, etc. etc. etc. Download it to YouTube and send us the link by March 1, 2010.
Three fabulous almost-celebrity librarian judges will deem which video is best based on creativity, content, and originality.
The winner receives (drumroll, please):
- A free copy of Camtasia Studio from Techsmith
- A free one year subscription for a new or existing Evanced product
- A $1000 scholarship to attend the American Library Association Annual Conference 2010 in Washington D.C.
Yeah, it’s kind of a big deal.
But, here’s the not so short version of the competition – which we recommend you read carefully!
CREATE a 3-5 minute video about why you love Evanced Solutions and/or our products. You might do a video about:
- you favorite product features
- things you like about our company
- a positive customer service experience
- descriptions of how Evanced products make scheduling, room reservations, or summer reading easier for you and your staff
- or a million other potential topics related to why you love us
DOWNLOAD the video release form by clicking here.
SIGN the release form (to be technical, a Director or Assistant Director with clearance to do so must sign it). Send the form in to our offices at: Evanced Solutions 7830 Rockville Road, Suite C. Indianapolis, Indiana 46214.
DOWNLOAD a free 30 day trial of Techsmith’s Camtasia Studio software at http://www.techsmith.com/camtasia.asp. (or use the video editting software of your choice)
CREATE a video in any format you wish. It can be funny, it can be serious, it can be a PowerPoint or claymation or pictures or whatever else you prefer. Work your creative mojo – there are no limits on your creativity! We just want you to tell us what you love about Evanced.
UPLOAD your video to YouTube and send the link to Christine Ayar, our Coordinator of Customer Experience at cayar@evancedsolutions.com
WAIT while our almost-celebrity librarian judges view, laugh, cry and enjoy the ultimate in cinematic self-expression and creativity.
DO A HAPPY DANCE if you find out you’re the winner when your name is announced at the Public Library Association Annual Conference March 23-27, 2010 in Portland, Oregon.
Here’s some of the fine print.
- Videos are not accepted for competition without receipt of the signed release form.
- Videos deemed inappropriate or containing lewd content will be disqualified. And we’ll tell your mama on you.
- Videos can be submitted by an individual or as a team.
- Library consortiums are not eligible as a whole, however, individual libraries within a consortium may submit a video and win software for their library only.
- States participating in state-wide Summer Reader are not eligible (i.e. an individual library within one of the states may win, but that will not qualify the entire state for free software!)
Have questions? Email Christine Ayar at cayar@evancedsolutions.com
December 21st, 2009 evanced
We got a lot of comments to our post about Worthington’s Drupal integration. Suggestions about additional CMS systems and such. While we certainly will look at what we can do to assist in those areas we are not likely to be deploying any new such CMS integration widgets ourselves in the next 6 – 9 months. However we are certainly open to supporting customers and other integration partners who want to do their own integration with our systems.
Here is a link to information on our Knowledge base explaining how our XML tool set works. This is the same tool set that libraries such as Worthington (OH), Howard County(MD), Orange County (FL), and King County (WA) have used to create their custom integrations. Support for the use of these tool sets is included in the support of your software so our team can help if you get stuck or have some trouble with any of those features.