President’s Report June 2021

Hello everyone,

We have a winner for this year’s free Street Library!! It is St Monica’s Primary in Evatt. The contact person will be Veronica Melville. Here is part of the school’s proposal:
“St Monica's Primary School in Evatt is happy to set up the Street Library and maintain it on the walkway near our oval that is close to Chomley Court, Evatt. This means that it will be accessed by St Monica's, Miles Franklin Primary and Copeland College communities as well as the public.
 
Our Year 6 Arts leaders will design the artwork to decorate the street library and paint it.  We will get the community involved by asking for donations to fill the library and invite them to the Launch.  Our Year 6 library leaders will be able to assist with monitoring and maintaining the library.  We will launch the Street library just before Book Week and will have our Year 6 technology leaders make a video of the launch for the St Monica's Facebook page. We will organise for photos to be sent to Street Libraries.”
 
On 26 May I gave a talk on behalf of our Branch to the Tuggeranong Evening VIEW Club. It was interesting that none of them could describe our logo. They can identify it now!!!! It was a pleasure to talk about our annual activities, the Awards process, show them the 2021 merchandise, explain about the role of NCACL and the Dog Tales exhibition and to end by reading them “Hark It’s Me, Ruby Lee!” while encouraging them to join in.
 
From the National Board the links have been sent for everyone to view the Judges presenting their comments on each Shortlisted book in every category. They are worth watching to learn more about each book and to hear the judges talk about their experience as a judge. Well done Lucy Long and Margaret Bromley from our Branch, who appear in the Eve Pownall link.
 
Our Merchandise order has arrived and hopefully we will be able to distribute the free items to members in plenty of time for Children’s Book Week.
 
The Branch “And The Winner Could Be...” night was held at ALIA House on June 16. Seventeen people attended and enjoyed an informative overview of the Shortlisted books. The presenters were:
Older Readers – Peter Arnaud
Picture Books – Jaimi-Lee Hudson and Meghan Scougall
Early Childhood – Kellie Nissen
New Illustrator – Alice Perry
Eve Pownall – Justine Power

Their choices for the Winning and Honour books in each category were interesting and we will see on 20 August how well their ideas align with the CBCA judges.

There was also an opportunity to purchase some of the Shortlisted books from a selection on display from The Book Cow Bookshop. Thank you Peter for facilitating this. There was also a display of the 2021 CBCA Book Week merchandise and the opportunity to purchase or order items.

Happy reading everyone,

Julie Long 
CBCA ACT Branch President