Has TJ’s comfortable routine become a rut? When an old friend comes to town with a challenge, TJ’s got to figure out what it really means to live a little without changing your life to meet someone else’s expectations. Week Daze zooms out and looks at our daily routines from a new perspective as all five weekdays play out simultaneously in a comic ballet. The live stage version of this play is also available. Comedy One-act. 30-40 minutes 6-7 actors, gender flexible

Newbery Award-winning and New York Times bestselling author Matt de la Peña's Mexican WhiteBoy is a story of friendship, acceptance, and the struggle to find your identity in a world of definitions. Danny's tall and skinny. Even though he’s not built, his arms are long enough to give his pitch a power so fierce any college scout would sign him on the spot. Ninety-five mile an hour fastball, but the boy’s not even on a team. Every time he gets up on the mound he loses it. But at his private school, they don’t expect much else from him. Danny’ s brown. Half-Mexican brown. And growing up in San Diego that close to the border means everyone else knows exactly who he is before he even opens his mouth. Before they find out he can’t speak Spanish, and before they realize his mom has blond hair and blue eyes, they’ve got him pegged. But it works the other way too. And Danny’s convinced it’s his whiteness that sent his father back to Mexico. That’s why he’s spending the summer with his dad’s family. Only, to find himself, he may just have to face the demons he refuses to see--the demons that are right in front of his face. And open up to a friendship he never saw coming. Matt de la Peña's critically acclaimed novel is an intimate and moving story that offers hope to those who least expect it. "[A] first-rate exploration of self-identity."-SLJ "Unique in its gritty realism and honest portrayal of the complexities of life for inner-city teens...De la Peña poignantly conveys the message that, despite obstacles, you must believe in yourself and shape your own future."-The Horn Book Magazine "The baseball scenes...sizzle like Danny's fastball...Danny's struggle to find his place will speak strongly to all teens, but especially to those of mixed race."-Booklist "De la Peña blends sports and street together in a satisfying search for personal identity."-Kirkus Reviews "Mexican WhiteBoy...shows that no matter what obstacles you face, you can still reach your dreams with a positive attitude. This is more than a book about a baseball player--this is a book about life."-Curtis Granderson, New York Mets outfielder An ALA-YALSA Top Ten Best Book for Young Adults A Junior Library Guild Selection

Have mothers gone mad? They magically do it all, yet never quite think they've accomplished enough. Full of hard-hitting anecdotes and advice.

An irreverent mash-up of the Little Red Riding Hood and Goldilocks tales, in which two rebellious females you think you already know break the rules of storytelling to show the importance of working together. Comedy One-act. 25-30 minutes 12-20+ actors, gender flexible

Warning! 'But whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.' Matthew 8:6 (KJV) Take heed, all of you unbelieving miscreants in the public school system bent on programming kids for the deceitful New World Order. That warning is from the King of kings! School Daze is written with a satirical bite and is tempered with comic relief. Its author, Lucia Jones, a teacher in the public school system, gives an up-close and personal look at the biggest issues plaguing the System today. Among these issues are school zoning that forces students to move schools (and sometimes neighborhoods) often, a lax teaching curriculum, incompetent school officials, sex education (starting in kindergarten), ditching the basics and the 3 Rs for cuddly, feely programs loaded with political correctness and the two faces of multiculturalism. Christian values no longer play a role in public schools. Some public schools have taken God out of the Pledge of Allegiance and have even gone so far as pledging allegiance to the Earth. Prayer is not allowed, and the Ten Commandments are no longer displayed. Christmas parties are now winter holiday parties. Even the treats for these parties are at the mercy of the System—no more candy and ice cream, but tofu smoothies and yogurt cups. Lucia Jones is a devout Christian, mother of four, grandmother of eleven, and a veteran elementary school teacher in the public school system of twenty-five-plus years. She has spent eighteen of those years teaching at a small public elementary school on an Indian reservation. Lucia lives in Northern Nevada with her husband, Tom.

Written in a friendly, easy-to-understand way by a master musician and computer expert, The Digital Songstream will be the first-and only-reference needed for anyone wishing to enter the world of computer music.

A state-of-the-art guide to virtual reference services! This essential book provides a snapshot of virtual reference (VR) services in all kinds of library settings and discusses the issues, trends, and practices involved in offering this kind of service. The chapters go beyond descriptions of services to offer practical advice and suggestions for product selection, policy setting, technical support, collaborative efforts, staffing, training, marketing, budgeting, evaluation, and administration. Case studies, relevant Web sites, and vendor information are included. An ample selection of tables, figures, and illustrations makes important information easy to access and understand. From the editors: “The purpose of this book is to describe the state of the art in virtual reference services, by which we mean real-time, interactive reference service with a librarian, offered online via chat or videoconferencing. Significant players in virtual reference services have prepared chapters for this book. Some of these address virtual reference as a service trend. Others describe services in a variety of settings, including public, academic, and special libraries. Some focus on one aspect of virtual reference, such as statistics/evaluation, policy setting, or the reference interaction. Our intent is to provide an opportunity for reflection on the impact of virtual reference services on librarians, clients, and libraries, as well as to offer a glimpse of the future.” Virtual Reference Services: Issues and Trends addresses topics that will help institutions and VR professionals provide more effective services. Chapters focus on: the principles and concepts of continuous quality improvement (CQI) for virtual reference, such as the Kano Model of user satisfaction—and how it can help libraries improve their VR services a case study of the adoption of VR service at the Suffolk Cooperative Library System in New York, with emphasis on the benefits of maintaining a user-centered perspective to help inform decisions about procedures and services staff selection, structuring the work environment, scheduling, and other VR issues at a large university library collaborative VR services in the state of New Jersey and the development of the “Q and A NJ” initiative and the experiences of two participating public libraries the development and testing of innnovative software developed through a partnership with a high tech company statewide and regional VR collaboration in Florida, with a comprehensive and detailed overview of that state's VR initiatives post-implementation issues such as high call volume, difficult users, training and quality assessment, and service improvement a report from a medical/dental library participating in a multitype library collaborative VR service—with insights on budgeting, training, administration/coordination, morale, marketing, user reaction, and how a health sciences library contributes to (and benefits from) this kind of initiative VR services at The Boeing Corporation a model and framework for collecting and making use of statistical data in a VR service, with AskERIC's implementation as an example the nature of the user-librarian VR interaction, with an insightful analysis of chat transcripts from Carnegie Mellon University how users interact with various services offered on library Web pages, with an illuminating comparison of the use of the library Web site search tool at Southern Illinois University-Carbondale vs. the use of the VR service available on that site