(left to right), Judd Sato, Jr., HSPLS Õ09 Employee of the Year; State Librarian Richard Burns; and members of the HSPLS Õ09 Team of the Year: ChildrenÕs Science Book Project Ð Duane Wenzel, Branch Manager; Kristine Kishida, Library Technician V; Curt Fukumoto, Librarian III; all at Salt Lake-Moanalua Public Library; and Edwin Kamikawa, Illustrator-Photographer of Library Development Services Section. Not pictured: Ann Luke, Library Technician V of Salt Lake-Moanalua Public Library.

MEDIA RELEASE

The Hawaii State Public Library System (HSPLS) announces the selection of their 2009 Employee of the Year and Team of the Year recipients, who were recognized and honored at the September 17 Board of Education Meeting at Queen Liliuokalani Building.

Judd Sato, Jr., Light Truck Driver of the HSPLS Logistics Support Services Section on Maui, is the 2009 HSPLS Employee of the Year. Sato, who is always smiling and happy, does an excellent job of packing up and delivering all the books for Maui County Libraries in a very timely and efficient manner. He will go out of his way when asked to do a little extra, whether he’s bringing in 15 – 20 bins of books from delivery or bringing in 10 – 15 boxes for mailing each day to the Neighbor Islands.

In addition, Sato, Jr. makes a distinctive and significant contribution to the Maui County community by coaching the Maui High School football team, and also collects Toys for Tots with his motorcycle club.

The Children’s Science Book Project is the recipient of the 2009 HSPLS Team of the Year Award. Team members include: Duane Wenzel, Branch Manager; Curt Fukumoto, Librarian III; Ann Luke, Library Technician V; Kristine Kishida, Library Technician V; all at Salt Lake-Moanalua Public Library; and Edwin Kamikawa, Illustrator-Photographer of Library Development
Services Section.

The Children’s Science Book Project, an annual event since 2004, endeavors to interest children in learning about science and technology through books, introduce adults to the wide variety and high quality of science books for children and aid teachers and librarians in selecting the best science trade books for their collections.

Each year, the Children’s Science Book Project Team sends letters to the top children’s publishers asking for complimentary review copies of their latest science trade books for children; reviews, rates, annotates and enters each book received; develops an annotated bibliography, arranged by subject, of all titles received that year and distributes 1,000 copies statewide in varying quantities to each public library.

In addition, the Team presents an opening exhibit of that year’s titles at the Salt Lake-Moanalua Public Library for a six-week period, and also develops a traveling exhibit of that year’s titles available to any public library in the state.

The Project has saved the State’s library materials budget an estimated
$26,000 over five years; distributed 4,000 “Children’s Science Book Project
Bibliographies” which are used by parents, teachers and librarians to select the
highest quality books for their children; displayed the Children’s Science Book
Project annual exhibit statewide at four public libraries each year (six-to-eight weeks per library), including two on Maui and two on the Big Island, thereby sharing resources and building circulation, especially in smaller, rural libraries with limited funding for buying library materials.

HSPLS is a stronger system with better collections as a result of the Children’s Science Book Project Team.

Staff members who earned the Sustained Superior Performance Awards for this year are Colleen Kainuma, Library Technician in the Hawaii State Library-Hawaii Documents Section, and Don Chambers, Jr., Library Technician at Mililani Public Library.

The above recipients will represent HSPLS in the 2009 Governor’s Award Ceremony scheduled for October.