Did you know the library has sheet music? As well as books on music theory, composition, instrumental technique, and music appreciation (I’ve always had mixed feelings about the latter, although that’s a different blog post), the library has a variety of scores, sheet music and fake books.
Our sheet music covers everything from classical (piano music, orchestral scores) to popular music of all eras. Check it out in the Music/Art/Media department.
There are also several sheet music resources on the internet. The Petrucci Music Library at the International Music Score Library Project has thousands of public domain classical scores for nearly every instrument imaginable. The scores are mostly in PDF format, and there are links to sites where you can hear and purchase recordings of many of the pieces. It is also very well organized with a variety of search options.
For guitarists who read tablature (something my son’s guitar teacher would frown upon), if you google “guitar tabs” you will find a number of useful sites, including ultimate-guitar.com.
Could the cost of a college education be the next economic bubble to burst? I got my undergraduate degree from Madison University and, at the time, I think my tuition probably amounted to maybe about $15,000? My mom paid for it. Thanks mom. UWM is a state university and I got in-state tuition – so I got a pretty good deal! But what about the kids nowadays (did I just use that word?) who want to go to school for $150,000? Wow. For me, that’s just not even something I can conceive of. (Maybe I don’t think big enough.)
I was listening to NPR the other day and heard about a college grad who took on $100K worth of loans and now is stuck with a $700 loan payment each month. This just shocked me. And, with The Atlantic reporting that student loans have grown 511% since 1999, I can understand predictions that the next bubble to burst might very well be secondary education. Another article in The Atlantic predicts that: “The next subprime crisis will come from defaults on student debts, starting with for-profit colleges and rising to the Ivy League.”
The article proposes that “ … it’s possible to get a fine bachelor’s degree at a reasonable cost and without going into debt. But students and their parents will have to stop thinking that name-brand prestige assures academic quality.” This statement made me think about an article I’d read in The Chronicle for Higher Education which profiled a family with five children; three had already graduated college, two are still in college. The approximate loan balances for the children who had graduated were $233,894, $90,660 and $190,665. I just wonder how much an average family can *help* towards paying for educations with those kinds of price tags; yet, the parents in this article stood firm in the belief that their kids will benefit from going to highly-regarded colleges and are baffled by the suggestion that either of their youngest two kids (both still in college) might want to try a community college.
They may be baffled, however, the idea of perhaps going to a less prestigious college, but still getting a valuable education is not uncommon. Check out “Brand Names, Bad Values?” or “Rising cost of college degree vs. its value.“ In fact, Kiplinger’s Personal Finance published a cover story in 2010 titled “Get the Best, Spend Less” where they matched the value of various institutions and compared their price. For example, MIT gets the gold for engineering and has an annual cost of $50,292. Kiplinger assesses an education at Georgia Institute of Technology as having the same value as MIT, but with an annual in-state cost of $16,810; out-of-state cost, $35,220. Hmmm. What would Kersten do?
Luckily I don’t have to do anything right now. And I sure am glad I did my diploma-gathering when the market conditions were in my favor.
This was a sad week for authors, illustrators, readers, and anyone with a vivid imagination as we mourn the death of the famous children’s author, Maurice Sendak. The NY Times published a great synopsis of his life, career, and achievements on Tuesday. I didn’t realize until I read the obituary that he took a 30-year hiatus from producing books he both wrote and illustrated. His rise to popularity began in the fifties and sixties around the time the book that many of us will remember him for, “Where the Wild Things Are” was published. This title also earned him one of the most prestigious awards in children’s literature, the Caldecott Medal. It was so well received it was eventually made into a film, which some considered more appropriate for adults reminiscing about the childhood book rather than children.
For those of you that would like to celebrate his life, but prefer a medium other than printed books you may want to watch his recent interview on the Colbert Report (part 1 and part 2 -both equally hilarious), or listen to an episode of Fresh Air on NPR, or spend a few minutes playing the video game “Where the Wild Things Are“.
AP tests start Monday, May 7. Are you ready? Doing well is super-important: starting college with some extra AP credits can help you graduate sooner and save on tuition, too.
Remain calm: You can get help studying for these exams by using Homework HelpNow!, available on the library’s website. There you can connect to online tutors with expertise in AP chemistry, calculus, English, history, biology, physics, and more.
These tutors are available from 4-11 pm. To connect to them, go to nashualibrary.org/homework.htm and click the blue Homework HelpNow! link. Then click the Live Help box.
You can take practice AP tests in certain subjects from our website, too. Get your score right away, with explanations of the correct answers. Go to nashualibrary.org/PracticeTestsDB.htm and click the link for LearningExpress Library.