As a librarian who follows congressional documents, I see a lot of publications cross my desk.  Some look interesting, some seem pretty routine, and some force me to stop what I’m doing and get lost for an hour in new information. That happened to me recently when a coworker mentioned an update of Senate Print 112-31 covering the cloture rule from 1917 to 2008.

Now, I’m certainly used to finding things interesting as a documents librarian that I know would not be of enough interest to warrant a blog post but the cloture rule and the associated notion of the filibuster have become an increasingly visible part of our legislative process. Whether it’s through increasing political news consumption or political dramatizations like The West Wing episode, “The Stackhouse Filibuster,” and Mr. Smith Goes to Washington, the American public has become fascinated with this particular piece of our legislative process. (For those who aren’t familiar with the distinction, filibuster can be any act meant to slow or halt approval of a bill and cloture is the formal procedure used to end debate and bring the bill to a vote).

So I'm back after a brief hiatus. We've been toiling away here at GPO writing the necessary policies so that a larger number of us can begin blogging about our work here for you, the FDLP Community. I've spent a lot of time working on EPA Brownfields grants (and I'll talk about them in the next blog post), but my primary obsession has been with government comics.

If you know me personally, you know that there's no better day in my week than Wednesday. Blessed Wednesday. Glorious Wednesday. The Peak of the Week.

Why? Because Wednesday is New Comic Book Day!

Well, it's been quite the week here at GPO—I had the great pleasure of attending the first three days of the Depository Library Conference. Between meeting members of the community, attending educational sessions, and answering questions about the Content Acquisitions department, I'm so excited/exhausted I don't quite know what to do with myself!

Luckily for me, I have a pre-made theme because October is Fire Prevention Month and I was asked to cover it for the Acquired Tastes Blog. Now October is known as Fire Prevention Month, but October 9-15 is specifically set aside by presidential proclamation as National Fire Prevention Week. Having attending a fascinating session on the Federal Register, I know that you can view this year's proclamation in the Federal Register Online, but if you were going to take the proclamation into court, you'd need to locate the print edition in a library or download an authenticated PDF from FDSYS, the Federal Digital System.

Twitter was also quite the topic of conversation this week and, wouldn't you know, Fire Prevention Week is also tweeting: @FirePrevWeek. The coolest thing about their feed, for me, is the list of almost 400 local, state, and national fire prevention agencies they're following. They're also featured on the United States Fire Administration's curated Twitter list! Be sure to check this out for a quick, easy source of re-tweetable fire prevention information. Major shout-out to Sonnet Ireland from the Earl K. Long Library at the University of New Orleans (@feddocs) for teaching me to tweet in her session at the DLC!

It’s been an interesting week here in Content Acquisitions. We’ve been testing out some new ideas and, as always, encountering a lot of new government publications. In a very exciting development, we added our first publications from the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) to the Catalog of Government Publications!

Established as part of The Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 (Dodd-Frank Act), the CFPB exists to “protect consumers by carrying out Federal consumer financial protection laws.” They’ve already produced a large amount of information on their Web site and we can expect to see a lot of publications over the next year as they become fully-operational. As a new (ish) employee of the Federal Depository Library Program, I was lucky enough to contribute to the research required to add the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to the List of Classes and wanted to share what that process looks like.

In early June, I was chatting with some friends about working for the Federal Government and one of them mentioned they were assisting in the official opening of the CFPB. When I got to the office the next day, I checked with my supervisor and found that we had not yet added the CFPB to the List of Classes because they had not yet released any publications. We figured out when the agency was officially beginning operation and what their first publications would be. The most complex piece, however, was deciphering how the agency was funded as news coverage referred to them as both an agency and a bureau. After some study, we were able to add them as a bureau of the U. S. Federal Reserve Board of Governors and class their first publications in FR 2.2: and FR 2.3:.

Before coming to GPO, I spent two years working for DC Public Schools. There’s something about September and the resulting back-to-school fever that’s impossible for teachers (and ex-teachers) to shake. Knowing that my former students are falling back into the familiar routine and my former coworkers are working like mad to start the school year on a good note, I thought it would be a good time to take a look at some cool resources from the U. S. Department of Education.

Each new school year is a fresh start for teachers, students, and parents. Having taken a few months off to reflect and reorganize, students are excited to learn, teachers are ready to implement new classroom models, and parents are wondering what they can do to help their kids succeed. Ever heard of Singapore Math? What about Read 180, Accelerated Reader, or AVID? Even after finishing my education degree, it always seemed like new programs were appearing faster than I could determine if they would benefit my students. Luckily the U. S. Department of Education’s What Works Clearinghouse provides a central location with easily searchable reviews. As a teacher, this provided me with invaluable information for planning my lessons and programs. For library patrons, it’s a fantastic way to learn a bit more about programs and approaches to education that haven’t been seen before.

A self-help guru once said, “men are from Mars, women are from Venus” and, whether I believe that or not, it’s certainly true that boys and girls have different educational needs. A U.S. Department of Education practice guide, Encouraging Girls in Math and Science (PURL | CGP record), offers concrete strategies to encourage girls in areas where they traditionally fall behind their male classmates. I especially like the section on creating classroom environments that create curiosity and long-term interest. If you’re interested in something other than math and science, there are several practice guides at their Web site and even a link to suggest a practice guide topic.