COVID-19 and Library Trends

Maw, Laura 

LM 

SJSU School of Information. (2020, May 26). Library issues and trends: Before, during, and after COVID-19 [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KkDy_CZZkjI

In this video presented by San Jose State University’s (SJSU’s) Leadership and Management Program Advisory Committee, current library trends were discussed, including trends in management and leadership, services, technology, and the library workforce. In terms of service trends, small scale pilots and experimental services have become even more important in an uncertain world. Also, the ability to use technology in libraries, such as 3-D printers, to help communities develop needed items like personal protection equipment, demonstrates the necessity for libraries to pivot services and resources to meet community needs. In the same vein, online learning services have increased as more people need to use tools online for learning. Further, YouTube service models are enabling services like story time to reach wider audiences as people can view the recorded video when it is convenient for them. 

I agree that library staff’s innovation and creativity are even more salient in a changing or uncertain world. Community members depend on their librarians to lead their community through change in a positive way, which in turn, instills community acceptance of the change.

Curbside Pickup Library Service

Maw, Laura 

LM 

Newfoundland & Labrador Public Libraries. (2020, June 17). Newfoundland and Labrador Public Libraries to begin curbside services, Tuesday June 23rd, 2020, at select locations [Press release]. Retrieved from https://www.nlpl.ca/cus_scripts/pdf/NLPL-to-begin-curbside-services.pdf 

Curbside pickup services are the beginning of the Newfoundland & Labrador Public Libraries building reopening services. Library branches are coming into the curbside service using a phased approach, with four branches starting. With this service, patrons can access their library’s physical collection again through a contactless service, where patrons order their materials online and pick them up by drive-thru service at their local branch. Drive-thru pick up appointment times are assigned. All returned materials are being quarantined for 72 hours to prevent the spread of COVID-19. 

I think this is an innovative way to allow patrons to access their library’s physical collection while still maintaining staff and community safety during the pandemic. I wonder if people may get used to the convenience of a drive-thru service and request to keep the service after the pandemic is over. This also seems like an excellent way to make libraries more accessible to people with mobility disabilities, where the physical building may be difficult to access.

Isolation and the Digital Library

Maw, Laura 

LM

Mercer, N. (2020, April 9). Newfoundland libraries adapting to isolation world with move to digital. The Chronicle Herald. Retrieved from https://www.thechronicleherald.ca/news/canada/newfoundland-libraries-adapting-to-isolation-world-with-move-to-digital-435936/

This article highlights how a library information community has been able to maintain their meetings and access to information using their library’s digital services and collection. Through the Wine, Women and Words book club, the importance of the local library in helping people maintain social connections during the COVID-19 pandemic is demonstrated. It is interesting to learn that this information community’s library, the Newfoundland & Labrador Public Library, had been bolstering their digital services and collection months before the pandemic; the reason is the same, however, to combat community isolation, which had been brought on by a terrible snow storm. With the community isolation measures due to the pandemic, the library has been experiencing more applications for library cards. 

I expect as people struggle to maintain social connections and mental wellness during the COVID-19 pandemic, more people will turn to their libraries, increasing patronage and demand for virtual library services and electronic materials.

Prison Library Collections

Paddock, Denise 

Vogel, B. (2009). Collection, coercion, and constitution: A collision with the absurd. In The prison library primer: A program for the twenty-first century (pp. 42–60). Scarecrow Press.

Brenda Vogel has been an authoritative voice on prison libraries for the last two decades. This chapter looks at prison library collections; what they should be; points out some flaws in arguments against a well-rounded collection, and gives a really good guide on creating a collection development policy that reflects library standards and can stand up to scrutiny. 

A few highlights are:

·      Collection’s, both in development and maintenance should follow same principles of librarianship as any other library.

·      There aren’t standards, basically at all. There are guidelines but none that prison administration have to adhere to. There are legal requirements that can be fulfilled but leave room for seriously limiting libraries.

·      There are some prison librarians that believe in self-censoring collections to decide what’s best for inmates. But luckily, these (at least those who put things into print) are quickly called out by others defending the principles of librarianship in prison libraries be upheld.

·      Great collection development policy justifications that are written out section by section.

This chapter does a great job of realistically looking at the likely issues a prison librarian will face- and how to be prepared. Issues being that libraries are libraries, and often can have arbitrary decisions about what isn’t acceptable, made by people outside of the library. She does a great job pointing out how and when to make the connections needed to prevent issues in the future. 

The presentation of the collection

Students learn things better if they have good background knowledge of any  new material. So we cannot assume they have certain amount of background knowledge or their background knowledge is same (Rosenshine, 2012, p.13). I remember when I was a primary school librarian; I used to visit Wikipedia for general knowledge of a topic and then listed all knowledge regarding the topic in a mind map. Sample of information content is in the screenshot below. Our students were very fond of display. I have not done this at my current school. The good thing to have all different sources related to the same topic put toghter expands the scope of knowledge of our students to a topic but also enhance students’ background knowledge regarding the topic (Wikipedia, n.d.). The arrangement will is easy for them to understand the concepts of the topic.

Figure 3. Screenshot of Content of Romeo and Juliet taken by Qing Zhao, accessed 9^th May 2020, Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romeo_and_Juliet

Summary

The collection development is not about how much resources library is going to buy. It is how to find useful resources and how best use them to support teaching and learning, how easy they are accessible. There are procedures to go through. Procedure are important to ensure we are on the right track. What is more important? I think the more important object is the person working in the library. The level of their professional knowledge, the depth understanding of patron needs, the openness to new change, the capability of their interpersonal skills will affect the quality of the collection development. 

References:

Figure 3. Content of Romeo and Juliet information. (n.d.). Wikipedia, Retrieved from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romeo_and_Juliet

Loertscher, D.V., & Crompton, M. (2018). Collection Development using the Collection Mapping Technique: a Guide for Librarians. (3rd ed. PP.121).  Salt Lake City, Utah: Hi Willow Research and Publishing

Why we need diversity formats of information in our collection

I had ignored the usefulness of different formats of information until recently. When I am looking for hair clip for my hair, I suddenly recalled the type of hair clip Daisy used for her hair. Daisy (Google, 2013, Figure 1) is one of main character in the film <The great Gatsby>. Her hair style and shape of face similar to mine. So I searched on Google and found the film post I needed as below.

Figure 1 Prada Dresses Daisy; The Great Gatsby Costumes – The Prim Girl, 2013, Retrieved from https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.theprimgirl.com%2F2013%2F05%2F03%2Fprada-dresses-daisy-the-great-gatsby-costumes%2F&psig=AOvVaw3jlJzcFpbOiASj1pazY2Ns&ust=1589263336283000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CA0QjhxqFwoTCLCUkreRq-kCFQAAAAAdAAAAABAZ

Recently I worked with English department to develop collection in Romeo and Juliet. English teacher told me that she needs diversity formats of the play. At my course of instructional plan, I learned the learning style and its connection with learning effect. Although, Daniel Willingham (Sanderson 2011, p.380) argues that auditory presentation of information is most useful when meaning is connected to that form of information.

I visited the Romeo and Juliet pages on Britannica School. Screenshot of it is as follows. I found that if materials I contact first, the best way for me to understand the content is combination of visual and auditory presentation of information. When I heard something I do not understand, I can know what the presenter is talking about by watch his presentation on video.

Figure 2. Screenshot of Romeo and Juliet webpage taken by Qing Zhao, accessed May 8^th 2020,  Retrieved from https://school.eb.com/levels/high/search/articles?query=Romeo+and+Juliet&includeLevelThree=true

When I chose new database, my suppliers offer me the introduction of their products, which all containing information of diversity of formats. The table below is made by me to compare offering from 2 different database suppliers. From teacher and vendor, they all require materials in diversity formats. I am an intermediary person between them, I realized the low interest in technology has affected quality of my work.

	Complete online package database	Student Resources Database	Opposing viewpoints database
For students	y	y	y
For teachers and administrators	y	n	n
Magazines	y	y	y
newspapers	y	y	y
biographics	y	y	y
primary sources document	y	y	y
encyclopeidas and reference books	y	y	y
images	y	y	y
maps	n	y	y
video	y	y	y

References:

Figure 1. Prada Dresses Daisy; The Great Gatsby Costumes – The Prim Girl. (2013). Retrieved from  https://www.google.com/url?sa=i&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.theprimgirl.com%2F2013%2F05%2F03%2Fprada-dresses-daisy-the-great-gatsby-costumes%2F&psig=AOvVaw3jlJzcFpbOiASj1pazY2Ns&ust=1589263336283000&source=images&cd=vfe&ved=0CA0QjhxqFwoTCLCUkreRq-kCFQAAAAAdAAAAABAZ

Figure 2. Screenshot of Romeo and Juliet page. (n.d.). Britannica School, Retrieved from https://school.eb.com/levels/high/search/articles?query=Romeo+and+Juliet&includeLevelThree=true

Sanderson, Heather. (2011). “Using Learning Styles in Information Literacy: Critical Considerations.” Journal of Academic Librarianship 37 (5): 376–85

Collection promotion and shift role of librarians at pandemic time

How to promote library collection and what is the role of librarian during pandemic?

Our school’s collections are largely paper based. When we all work at home, I cannot circulate materials in the library.  Students and teachers cannot get physical books from library. If the paper collection can do nothing to help students and teachers, what library can do to show our commitment to support academic work?

1. Promote all online resources we have

The online presentation organized by EBSCO (Yang, 2020) mentioned that how other librarians promote their online collection service. My school has 2 databases for G11 and G12 and 3 educational sites for all year groups.

Those databases and educational sites do not provide eBooks and eAudiobooks for students. When amazon opens its audible books for free, I posted the news on Moodle, which is a learning platform for students and staff to communicate.

2. Proactively communicate with different professionals whose work has connection with library

2.1 other librarians and social media

Librarians like to share their thoughts and ideas on social media. Get involve into their network and ask for help or offer what you know with them. This is how I get many information and new resources.

1.2 Proactively work with vendors and publishers

Vendors and publishers are great sources of information. Workshops .e.g Librarians’ action taken during pandemic organized by EBSCO, teach online organized by National Geographic give us inside what resources and information needed by teachers and students.

1.3 Proactively work with teachers and students

The major force for our students to receive information and read information and books is from their teachers. Therefore, I emailed teachers with my wish to support their work. I also emailed them some useful tips to teach online and researched resources to support their teaching.

When school called for offering online co-curriculum activity, I organized an online research CCA. It works well and was appreciated by students and administrators.

1.4 role change

In Ali’s (2020) article, he mentioned librarian’s role change to fit to new needs of community. My role shifted to be mentor for 2 students who were disengaged into online learning.  

1.5 store information

I listened an online course (Zhu, n.d.) and learned some tips to organize computer files. Our library management system did not good at organize computer files and I am the type of person who have many brilliant ideas but need support to organize resources. I am now using Onenote to store and organize my resources and files. I classify those resources and files according to topics they belong to, so if I need any resource in the future, I can quickly find them through topic search on OneNote.

References:

Ali, M. Y., (2020) The COVID‐19 (Coronavirus) pandemic: reflections on the roles of librarians and information professionals. Retrieved from  https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/hir.12307 

Yang, L. P. (2020, March). Upgrade ourselves in a crisis-a case sharing from XJTLU Library. Presentation presented at the EBSCO online webinar, Beijing. Retrieved from  https://ebsco.webex.com/ebsco/m.php?MTID=e37924f93669530f26cc2e099e288ec7d

Zhu, D. (n.d.). Module 13: Most systematic way to organize your computer files [Class speaknotes]. Retrieved from
https://appvjpmzbar5202.h5.xiaoeknow.com/v1/course/audio/a_5cb340a664b2c_OdroojLH?type=2&pro_id=p_5cb340a3de420_r715Fu96&source=2&ct_app_id=YXBwOUhlNThiSGw5MDc4