Local Librarians’ Responses To YSS XIX

• The Youth Services Symposium XIX was held in two locations (Deer Creek and Sandusky) to insure that local librarians from across Ohio could participate.  Response to the program was very positive. Several attendees offered their thoughts on the program:

  Laura Perenic, Children’s Coordinator from  Middletown Public Library, Middletown: Trying to focus on my teen readers has always been a struggle for a variety of reasons.  First and foremost  is the lack of time and  motivation resulting from  lack of previous participation by teens and lack of enthusiasm by other adults.  The Youth Services Symposium in Mt. Sterling was my first opportunity to meet librarians who work solely with teens or who split their time among children and teen patrons.  I found the experience profoundly helpful. Initially I was overwhelmed by the challenge of finally accomplishing what my job description says I’ve been doing for four years. When the reality sunk in that I was surrounded by resources and out of excuses I took what I had learned and applied it.

  Our second day session with Rose Mary Honnold Teen Programs That Work instilled a profound sense of creativity. My desire to put a personal and economical influence on reliable teen programs left me with an incredible list of goals for the upcoming year.  My desire to entertain and encourage my teens was partially tempered by my lack of belief in arts and crafts for young adults.  I plan to hold a temporary tattooing and henna program this fall just to prove myself wrong.  It took some work to get over my mental hurdles about what teens will and will not attempt in the presence of adults. However, after talking with many librarians who have run programs I would consider challenging and just plain risky, I was able to formulate a plan for my library.  I was impressed by the number of librarians who had success with Teen lock-ins at their branches. 

  I was equally impressed by Rollie Welch The Guy Friendly YA Library : Serving Male Teens, though I chafe at the idea that boys need extra coddling when it comes to improving themselves through reading.  I appreciated Mr. Welch’s overall message that a collection of books with  appeal to diverse backgrounds is key to success.  Mr. Welch’s enthusiasm for his troubled teens and their reading needs was palpable and infectious.   I have made a point to order many of the titles on his suggested reading list and to talk up the titles I currently own.  It was quite a gift to learn about so many titles to appeal to young adults living in poverty, struggling with their education or dealing with criminal activities.  I can definitely pass these on to teens who would benefit from shared experiences of the characters. 

  Jennifer Sommer. Children’s Librarian, at Wright Memorial Public Library: This was a wonderful conference and the setting at Deer Creek could not have been nicer. To me, the highlight was the brilliant talk given by John Green, of whom I am a huge fan. Fascinated by his experiment with his brother Hank where they communicated daily by videoblog- www.sparksflyup.com/weblog.php  for one year. I immediately went home to watch some of the videos and check out the websites they had created. I also shared the link with my writer friends along with the link for his omnictionary http://omnictionary.com/index.php/Main_Page This is a wiki based page where background information could be incorporated for the book he’s now working on, “Paper Towns”. John Green is a relatively young guy and he showed exactly how teens might apply their knowledge of technology.

  I came away with more ideas to try with the teens such as videoblogs and podcasts. We already use blogs here to review teen books. We have Guitar Hero and DDR, and we have a MySpace page. However, the idea that we could have teens compete to make videos about the library (an idea from Laura Solomon), put podcasts on our MySpace page (suggested by RoseMary Honnold), or hold a contest for the best/worst ring tones, (since the importance of a cellphone to a teen is very high), are things I hadn’t thought of. I began to think about how we could use text messaging with the teens. Using digital forms of outreach is something we need to explore further. Finally, Anita Silvey, who always gives a fabulous presentation about books, also showed that some books now have trailers, just like movies do, and might be added to a blog. Teens can also create trailers for their favorite books and review books that way. Fascinating!