Positioning the library for 2020
From PLN
Positioning the library for 2020
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PLN Challenge, May 2008
edited by Walt Crawford, published May 19, 2008
The April 2008 PLN Challenge asked leaders to consider the primary roles of their libraries in 2020. This month, we have a followup question:
What's the biggest thing you're doing now to position your library for 2020?
As always, these responses are just the beginning. You're invited to add your own responses, here or on the Talk page.
Pamela Snelson
In my particular situation, the biggest thing I'm doing has to do with library space. Shelf space in both library buildings is at a premium but student space is good. However, both buildings are aging and were designed for a student population of late baby-boomers. The campus master plan includes both new and renovated buildings. I need to work constantly at keeping the needs and plans for library space in the conversation. If the library misses an opportunity to expand and renovate space it will be difficult to recover lost ground--much more so than for collections or staff.
Sara Weissman
Today during a strategic plan brainstorming session we talked about being ready for new patrons who will be less, not more, conversant with the use of a library.
Gen X and Y are not the children of the '50s in their Carnegie libraries. And if, as last week's sampling demonstrated, 77% of the questions asked in the building are asked at the circ desk does that mean the library is hard to use?
The discussion ranged over ways to staff smart...how and where to deploy librarians according to traffic patterns in the building. Perhaps best summed up as fluid service, our trials would offer the currently voguish information desk just the two days a week when over 1,000 people come through the doors. Rovers would be those who want to do it, for they will do it best. We have increasing numbers of senior patrons who are hard of hearing, at whom one has to yell an answer. Is it time to pull telephone reference off the public desk and send it back into the private office area?
In short: preparing for the future means anticipating the nature and needs of the patrons who want your help. The biggest thing a public library has to do to position itself is: know your public.
Joe Lucia
2020? I’m struggling with 2010! Seriously, it seems to me that we witness the waxing and waning of entire technological phases in about three year cycles in this nascent digital age, so “planning” much beyond a three year window requires that we look beyond ephemeral diversions to focus on bedrock constructs.
To say it straight: I am most concerned that we establish real clarity about the cultural and social functions of libraries among our constituents and that we engage them in a continuous conversation about what we do, why we do it, and how we do it. I think we need to fire up our imaginations (and theirs) about the big picture – the unique things libraries stand for as cultural and social agents. Among those are: literacy and the pleasures of reading; open access to and support for creative and critical discourse as embodied in books, texts and expressive works of all sorts; the care and feeding of the intellectual and cultural commons; and sustenance for the conversations at the heart of our communities.
I am an academic librarian, so my focus is largely on the academy. I believe that we must energize our physical and virtual spaces with the power of the muses, to use a notion I have taken from Sam Demas’s writings on libraries and the mouseion.[1] We must envision libraries as environments that stimulate, inspire, and engage our natural constituents--students, scholars and lifelong learners. Do that, in partnership with students and faculty, and all else will follow: new services, lively spaces, rich digital infrastructure, effective technology, creative, thoughtful and highly-motivated staff.
- ↑ Sam Deams, "From the Ashes of Alexandria: What's Happening in the College Library." In Library as Place: Rethinking Roles, Rethinking Spaces. CLIR Pub 129, available on the web.
Related articles
- Library roles in 2020 - The April 2008 PLN Challenge
- Looking back--an open PLN challenge - What did your library do in the last 10-15 years to position itself for today?
- Leadership issues redux-May 2008 - the LLN Peer Panel considers key library issues.
- A call for OpenLibrarianship - Carl Grant proposes a set of mind-stretching changes in practice and attitude.
- Future catalogs: food for thought - Eric Lease Morgan ofers an extended set of visions for future library "catalogs."
- Do libraries innovate? - Where would this catalog of the future come from? The September 2007 LLN Peer Panel discusses library innovation.
- Too expensive to ignore - Glen Holt argues that rapidly increasing energy expenses will "shatter any semblance of equilibrium" in libraries.
Your turn: Talk about it
So what's your take? How are you positioning your library for the future? Steven Bell offers another take on the Talk page - we encourage you to add your own comments.
