Librarians in different contexts provide many services and resources to the local, school, and professional community (Library Council of New South Wales 2008). In my virtual study visits, I was lucky enough to encounter libraries operating in vastly different contexts, illustrating how they effectively provide services to their end users. For this this blog post, I will be focusing on three vastly, yet successful institutions
Bundaberg Community Library – Steven Harris
Albury Wodonga Health Library – Anne Griffith
West Moreton Anglican College Library – Tehani Croft
Each of these libraries serves different purposes and these study visits were an interesting way to gain an insight into how they effectively serve their clientele. Public libraries contribute to the social, cultural, and environmental aspects of community life (Library Council of New South Wales 2008) and continue to be positive influences in the local economy.
One area I first noticed was some key themes from each presentation. These themes included promoting a culture of learning, creating safe spaces for wellbeing and support for introducing new and emerging technologies. Bundaberg Library, located in regional Queensland, is a community library with a strong focus on creating spaces for well-being, Steve Harris, a proactive and passionate librarian, believes that providing spaces – both digital and physical- that focus on accessibility is one of his key factors of success (Harris 2024). They have developed many community and cultural programs that build well-being in the community (something I would love to implement in my own space) as well as identified future trends and their impact on the community they serve – especially concerning the coming digital divide ( Harris 2024) It is more important than ever for librarians to show their trend finding prowess, less we find ourselves in an information wasteland (Gordon 2021). To illustrate the well-being nature of his space, Steven even shared an unfortunate story about a client whose end of life happened in the library space – libraries are such important resources for people who have nowhere else to go (Harris 2024).
Anna Griffith at Albury Wodonga Health Library had quite a different story to tell. With a focus on research work – her collection and mission differed vastly from that of a public community library. Anna stated (2024) that special librarians managed a vast range of resource types – and it was important for her to initially create a space that was going to be used (the previous library being very underutilized and not current). It was interesting to hear Anna’s process of creating a “one-stop shop” for all her clients – almost forcing them to have no other choice but to use the library space. Being a trusted source of information allowed Anna to advocate for better resources – “When you create a somewhere where people want to go, then they will go (Griffith 2024). Librarians are expert information specialists but also need to communicate the services and resources they provide effectively (ACT Government). For Anna, this ability to design and create the one-stop shop for all of the online databases and health resources in her collection on the discovery frontpage allowed her to advocate for the importance of her positions ( I’ve learnt that I need to implement evidence-based practice more often) Using her information expertise, she could activate information for her users as she “wants people to use the services she has (Griffith 2024). Professional libraries differ from community and school libraries as the resources they provide are far more streamlined to their specific context (Special Library: Characteristics and Functions, n.d.) because of this, complex searching as a service must be trained to be able to be used effectively. This training for clients further provides evidence for Anna of her importance in accessing information services.
Finally, school libraries – the ones I am most familiar with. I loved hearing from Tehani and how she has built such an amazing collection and library space in which two classrooms are stuck together (Croft 2024) I could relate much more to Tehani’s vision as it was so much like my own. School librarians play such a key role in a school community (Godfree & Neilson, 2018) so much more than just the “keepers of books” School libraries provide users with information expertise in their ability to work horizontally across an organization (Softlink 2017) and a strong ability to command 21st-century pedagogies (ACT Government). It was lovely to see Tehani’s ability to work with issues that arose – showing her creativity and flexibility. Creating a sense of community within her library, Tehani was able to use evidence-based practice to enhance and advocate for her services and resources – providing spaces for students to read, managing resources according to year level and now looking at a whole library redesign for a new school (Croft 2024). Research shows that having a full-time qualified Teacher librarian within a school library has a positive impact on student literacy levels, well-being creates opportunities for future skills ( Godfree and Nielson 2018) and we can see this play out in Tehani’s library space – especially during lunchtimes (Croft 2024). the evidence provided by Tehani Croft effectively shows the increased quality of the usage of the library’s resources – although they did mention the cost of digital resources being exceptionally high for use (Croft 2024) This is something that I have noticed – students still prefer hard copy books! As she said, however, they can take ClickView from “my cold dead hands!”
References
Griffith, A (2024) Albury Wodonga Health Library Video Link
Croft, T (2024) West Moreton Anglican College Library Video link
Godfree, H., & Neilson, O. (2018). School Libraries Matter!* The missing piece in the education puzzle. https://studentsneedschoollibraries.org.au/wp-content/uploads/Holly-Godfree-and-Olivia-Neilson-ACCESS-March-2018-editors-note.pdf
Gordon. C.A (2021) The Essential School Library: A prototype for the reform of 21st century education. Synergy, 19(1). https://slav.vic.edu.au/index.php/Synergy/article/view/497
Library Council of New South Wales. (2008). Enriching Communities: The value of public libraries in New South Wales. In State Library of New South Wales. Retrieved May 13, 2024, from https://www.sl.nsw.gov.au/sites/default/files/Enriching%20Communities%20-the%20value%20of%20public%20libraries%20in%20New%20South%20Wales%20Summary%20Report.pdf
School Libraries: The Heart of 21st Century Learning. (2019). In https://www.education.act.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0007/1435435/School-Libraries-The-Heart-of-21st-Century-Learning.pdf (ACT Government). Australian Capital Territory 2019. Retrieved May 13, 2024, from https://www.education.act.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0007/1435435/School-Libraries-The-Heart-of-21st-Century-Learning.pdf
Special Library: Characteristics and Functions. (n.d.). https://epgp.inflibnet.ac.in/epgpdata/uploads/epgp_content/S000021LI/P000102/M004257/ET/1498804480ModuleIDSRL-1-etext-SpecialLibraryCharacteristicsandFunctions.pdf
Softlink. (2017). The ongoing importance of school libraries. Retrieved from https://www.softlinkint.com/downloads/The_Ongoing_Importance_of_School_Libraries.pdf
Wee, D. (2024) Rare Books Collection, State Library of Victoria Video link
