Friday, July 24, 2009

Trends in Libraries

I have been reading some really interesting articles about new things libraries have been doing recently and this is a great forum for expounding on that. First, I'll recap a little of this week at Ellettsville. Busy, busy, busy! I can hardly remember all that happened, in fact. I have had some time off desk to work on and finish my collection development project. What a relief to be finished with it! It was a lot of fun but it is a weight off of my shoulders to have completed it so far ahead of schedule! Our branch manager is out for two weeks starting today, so we will see what the next couple of weeks bring...

So, I read this great article in the most recent edition of Library Journal and it discusses collection development on the subject of volunteerism. This is a really interesting topic and you would think with the influx of unemployment, etc. that more people would be asking questions about volunteering. So far I get very few questions about that at the reference desk. Hopefully this will change as we get closer to September 11th, which has been declared a national day of service for the first time this year.

President Obama called on libraries to boost volunteerism and volunteering materials to their patrons and I completely agree with him. What better place than the library? First and foremost we can encourage people to volunteer AT the library, which would immediately benefit the library and the community it serves. In addition, this also allows the library the chance to educate its patrons on how the library functions. Hopefully, after learning the inner workings of the library patrons will feel more confident when searching for information and materials.

Libraries are all about service to their communities so why shouldn't that be the first place people go to start learning about giving back? One of the reasons I am so drawn to public librarianship in the first place is the service aspect. We are in a great position to provide valuable service and education to our patrons and to equip them with the skills they need to help others. It's kind of the, "it takes a village" mindframe and if people were more concerned about giving back, or just giving, than take, take, taking just think of all the obstacles this nation could overcome. It will be exciting to see how libraries establish their roles in these uncertain and stressful times.

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