The survey ran in July 2014 and we pushed the link out through Twitter, various Facebook groups, and people we knew. Here are some of our results:
- 98% of those surveyed work with their local schools.
- 76% of those surveyed have collaborations that take place at both the school and the public library. 15% take place only at the schools and 6% take place only at the public library.
- 63% of those surveyed have 2 or less people who work with their local schools.
- When asked how often they work with local schools, 23% said once a week, 39% said once a month, 7% said once every 6 months, 9% said once a year, and 22% said whenever they could fit it in.
- Ideas for working with local schools include booktalks (46%), story times (60%), field trips (60%), summer reading visits (80%), library instruction (33%), and other (41%).
My mentee's favorite question was “Have you incorporated
technology into any programs run with your local schools? If so, what types of technology have you used
and how have you used it?” She was very
impressed with the types of technology incorporated into collaborative
programs. Many of the responses included
working with tablets (iPads), eReaders (Kindles), and Web 2.0 tools such as
Skype or Prezi. Fun ideas included
having a Techmobile visit local schools, using Prezi with school tours, and a
virtual tour of Overdrive. Plus, one
library is giving all of their local high school students e-access cards so
they will have access to all of the library’s databases.
So what next? It is 3 months after our project and I was able to use this information in creating this year's goals for our department. As a young library system, we tended to have a hit-or-miss relationship with our schools. This year we are doing more targeting and the relationship has become a higher priority. Here are some things we have or will be accomplishing:
- We will have a position created and this person will be responsible for coordinating all school collaborations. With 47 schools, it is easy to get bogged down or lose track of what we did and where.
- We started a teacher enewsletter that is sent out bimonthly.
- We have spoken to local PTO's and have gotten on the agenda for teacher development days to talk about the library and what we can offer.
- We will be visiting local middle schools during conferences to sign kids/teens up for library cards.
I would be interested in seeing more about the results of your survey. Will you be publishing it anywhere?
ReplyDeleteRight now we aren't planning on publishing it anywhere. If you send me an email to lisaslibraryland at gmail.com, I will gladly forward you a spreadsheet of the results.
DeleteI've seen your post on Mich-Lib for this position,and it was really cool reading your blog and seeing the reasoning behind creating this position. I work for a smaller library and while we do some collaboration with our local schools, one of my goals is to do more. This post has some great ideas in it. What a great project for the student your worked with and for children's librarians in general!
ReplyDeleteThanks! I am really excited about the possibilities.
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