Small Town Librarian

CNet has an article on the effectiveness of web filters: Do Web filters protect your child? The answer is yes, to a certain extent, but they cannot be ultimately relied upon. Of course filtering in libraries is a touchy subject, because many of us are forced to filter by boards, other of us want to filter but can't, and then there are some of us who agree with the policy the board has created whether it is to filter or not.

In small libraries, the issue is that you either filter all computers or none. We don't have room to have a children's computer area and an adult computer area. Here in the library I run, we don't filter at all. Have we had issues? Yes. Have we dealt with them? Yes, and continue to. We have a tap-on-the-shoulder policy and have deliberately placed our computers in a very public area. So we simply ask people to stop. Our patrons, even those doing it, understand the problem and have almost always willingly stopped. There are exceptions (aren't there always?) but frankly we have more trouble with a man loudly swearing on his cell phone in the library than with porn on library computers.

We also have a policy where children under age 18 have to have parental permission (written) to acces the Net at the library. This has been very helpful on the rare occasions when we have a kid get into trouble online. We had one girl give out her name, personal information and PHONE NUMBER on a public chatroom. She got calls from men across the country. But her mother had signed the policy, and we had all warned her over and over not to do it. She was in the reckless teen mode and didn't care to listen. But she learned after that.

How about you? Do you filter? Does your policy work? Would you change it if you could?

Posted by at 7:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Patrons can be simply amazing.  One of my most mortifying problems in this building has been the lights.  Lighting is particularly important for libraries, as all of you know.  It can be very hard to read in the dark!  Our lights have been an issue for over TEN YEARS now.  Our patrons are tired of it, the Board is tired of it, and I am more than tired of it.  We haven't just sat around watching the bulbs burn out.  We have had many electricians in, bulbs changed, entire fixtures examined, company reps in, and much more.  We have spent thousands of dollars on lights alone.  Much more than we have spent on any other part of this building.  And nothing has worked for any length of time.

But there is new hope.  Just before the Board finalized plans to replace all of the existing fixtures for more thousands of dollars, a patron overheard a conversation and said that he thinks it is a more basic problem, voltage fluctuation.  We are now going to have the electric company put a meter on the building to check for fluctuation.  We are all hoping it is something that simple. 

Thank goodness he spoke up.  All I can see is rows of shiny new fixtures that all continue to blink on and off, blow bulbs, and yes, even burst into flame.  Now my new vision is the lovely fixtures we already have actually working for the first time in their lives. 

Posted by at 12:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Christian Science Monitor has a great article titled:  "Libraries as places to linger and mingle."  Finally a journalist has written a piece on the modern library that is not saying we are all going to close our doors due to the Internet, but gets libraries at a deeper level, as a community place, a place that patrons can go to be accepted, find knowledge, and meet others.  That is the type of library I want mine to be, a place to linger and mingle.

Posted by at 10:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

My days are getting away from me as my office fills with problem items (those ones that are miscataloged, damaged, scratched, missing parts, etc), books waiting for reviews, minutes to be typed from recent meetings, books to be blogged onto the new materials blog, donated items waiting to be either cataloged or sent to the book sale, review journals waiting to be read, and notes from staff, patrons and myself about issues that have to be handled. 

Occasionally I feel a little overwhelmed, but in truth, I would rather be busy than wondering what to do with my time.  Perhaps that is why I like running a small library, there is never a lack of things to work on and the variety is endless.

I suppose at this point I should share a photo of my piled-high desk and what was once a lovely, light-filled office.  But that would involve finding my digital camera, which is in here somewhere...

Posted by at 10:41 AM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Library 2.0 is a meme that has been flying around the library blog world for awhile now.  In a recent post to ALA TechSource, Michael Stephens and Michael Golrick had a conversation about how Library 2.0 (a technological look at customer service and updating library service to patrons) will affect those who may not be technologically literate. 

In small libraries, there is also a spectrum of those who embrace technology and those who dismiss it or reluctantly turn to it when necessary.  Perhaps our first step has to be making sure that librarians themselves are using the technology, teaching the technology, and enjoying the technology.  Without that, we are not going to be able to move forward.  And this has to come from library administrators themselves.  We have to be able to speak tech and understand what has a role in libraries and what we can dismiss as simply noise. 

But I believe that 2.0 has to be about more than technology.  It has to be about customer service at a higher level.   We have to ask ourselves how we start saying yes to patrons, what we can do to remove artificial barriers that we have created, and where we can go if we decide to progress beyond what libraries traditionally do.  Technology is a part of this, but it has to be about people.  It has to serve the patrons themselves if we are to be a success. 

Even more so, it has to be about reading and books.  It was the combination of books and people that originally drew me to library science.  We cannot allow our new love of technology to move us beyond books, because I don't see a future for libraries if we turn away from the core of our service, the provision of books and information.  So how can we create a conversation that this not only about technology, but asks about patrons and books and service as well.  We must broaden the scope of 2.0 to become about more than technology so that we call all embrace a future that we all believe in together.

Posted by at 10:13 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Tonight is board meeting night. So a couple of hours ago I was flying around here making copies for the meeting, creating the finalized list of bills, figuring out what requests from board members I had to have answers for, etc.  If you are a director, you know the dance that has to be done the day of the meeting.  It's not that I leave things to the last minute, rather things have to be left to this point or I don't have all the bills, don't have all the requests, and don't know what other items I am going to stumble over that have to be discussed, signed, etc. 

Once my Board was thinking of meeting only a few times a year.  Reluctantly, I had to tell them that we had to meet each month because the library was important enough to meet about.  Since then, the meetings have become longer because we are taking on more complex projects and the board members are doing readings before each meeting that they then discuss at the meeting. 

The Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction (DPI) has created a handbook for public library trustees that lets a board read a short chapter each month and then has questions at the end that they can discuss and answer.  It is a wonderful way to have quality discussions, let trustees know about the complex issues in libraries, and face issues before they become serious problems.  My board has done the Essentials several times through now and truly believe in them.  Because we have some board turnover each year, we continue to cycle through them.  Interestingly, each time through the discussions are different, so we are gaining additional perspectives each time. 

If you aren't from Wisconsin, I am sure your state provides materials like this.  From conversations with other library directors, I don't think enough of us are using them with our boards.  Give it a try, your board may surprise you!

Posted by at 11:26 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

No matter how you feel about Google.  Are they the wave of the future, the company leading to real digitization.  Or.  Are they riding the coat-tails of libraries and trying to take credit for the work of many in library science while dismissing libraries and their impact on communities and society. 

No matter.  You probably want to subscribe or be aware of Google's Newsletter for Librarians.  The first edition is online right now and offers an article on how Google ranks its listings.  Interesting stuff, even if you are a cynic like me about what Google is doing with digitization. 

Posted by at 6:28 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Happy New Year!  May your year be filled with kind patrons, generous funding, and big ideas.

Posted by at 9:55 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)