The Disaster Information Specialist: An Emerging Role for Health Librarians

ABSTRACT

This article describes the emergence of disaster information (DI) specialists, with particular focus on their presence in health libraries. Although literature on the subject of disasters and libraries is dominated by accounts of librarians preserving collections and ensuring continuity of library operations following a flood, fire, or other disaster event, the work of DI specialists extends beyond these traditional roles. DI specialists conduct outreach in the community, providing information services to emergency managers and other disaster workers. This article recounts a history of disaster information service in which public librarians served communities during disaster recovery periods, and health librarians became involved in organizational disaster planning activities. DI products from the National Library of Medicine are introduced in addition to federal funding opportunities for DI outreach projects. The development of the Medical Library Association's Disaster Information Specialization Program is presented, and the article shares recommendations for library administrators to encourage DI training for librarians and support the development of outreach services to disaster workers.     

SOLINET's Gulf Coast Libraries Recovery Projects for Public and Academic Libraries

SUMMARY

In 2005, Hurricanes Katrina and Rita damaged many libraries along the Gulf Coast. Due to widespread destruction in communities, library recovery has been slow. With support from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, SOLINET implemented two projects in 2006 to insure that library services remain available in the region. The projects provide temporary public library facilities in communities where libraries were destroyed, distribute grants to restore services at academic libraries and support planning in public libraries, and provide education to facilitate recovery. The projects also address planning for long-term recovery and improved preparedness for future disasters.     

Disaster Planning in Libraries

ABSTRACT

Disaster preparedness is an important issue in library management today. This article presents a general overview of the theoretical aspects of disaster planning in libraries. The stages of disaster planning are a circular process of planning, prevention, response, recovery, preparedness, and training.     

Outreach

Abstract

Academic libraries have often participated in outreach to their surrounding communities. This article focuses on independent outreach efforts of academic libraries to move beyond their walls or traditional clientele. Academic libraries determine their interaction with their communities based on three factors: whether a need is expressed from outside the academy, whether they see their mission as an invitation to pursue an action on their own accord, or whether they construct a form of outreach in response to a specific problem or crisis. Most libraries, public and private, recognize outreach as part of their mission and obligation to the community. This article examines why libraries choose to initiate outreach programs.     

Emergency Preparedness in the Legal Librarian Community in the United States: Current Culture and the Need to Expand Collaboration

The frequency of natural disasters hitting populated areas is increasing, and due to society’s increased dependency on modern infrastructure, the impacts of disasters have also escalated. I interviewed librarians and law librarians who work or have worked in libraries that were impacted by natural disasters as well as experts in the disaster management field. From their comments and insights, shared in this article, it is clear that there are lessons that can be learned from the larger community in the area of disaster management in law libraries. The law librarian community needs to expand the scope of the national discussion to include disaster management. The key lessons obtained in these national forums, like those shared by the subject matter experts I interviewed, will enable law libraries to become a more resilient and an even more valuable asset to the communities we serve when a natural disaster strikes.     

Public Library Public Access Computing and Internet Access: Factors Which Contribute to Quality Services and Resources

SUMMARY

This article explores a number of variables which can contribute to the quality of public access computing and Internet services that public libraries provide their communities. Through this exploration, the article offers several insights and implications for the development and implementation of high quality public access computing and Internet services which increasingly technology-savvy users expect from service providers. A key focus of the article is determining the extent to which some public libraries can reasonably provide high levels of network-based services given staff, budgetary, and other constraints and challenges.     

The present status of library services to children and young adults in Japanese public libraries and their future

ABSTRACT

Both Children’s services and Young Adult (YA) services have been recognized as essential in Japanese public libraries. This article reports on the present status of Children’s services and YA services in Japanese public libraries, based on the results of several investigations. These studies show that children’s services in Japanese public libraries already are generally popular. On the other hand, this article indicates that YA services in Japanese public libraries are gradually improving, due to the national recognition of the importance of YA library services. Examples of good practices in Children’s and YA services in Japanese public libraries are described and analyzed to identify the common themes that flow through these innovations. This article concludes with observations about the future involving library services for children and YAs, from the viewpoints of face-to-face traditional services and indirect services through their official websites.     

Public Libraries in the Eyes of the LGBTIQ Community: The Case of Croatia

ABSTRACT

The achievement of social justice, which implies the development of collections and the design of services for different user groups, is an objective present in the mission of public libraries. Since the 1950s, Croatian public libraries have been continuously developing collections and services for different user communities. However, one user community has remained largely unrecognized – LGBTIQ people. Therefore, the aim of the research presented in this paper is to examine the importance of the role of public libraries in the life of the LGBTIQ community in the Republic of Croatia. With a sample of 259 respondents, information behaviors, attitudes and experiences of LGBTIQ people in relation to public libraries have been examined via an online survey. In particular, this study explored the extent to which members of public libraries differ from non-members. The obtained results should contribute to a better understanding of the information needs and behavior of members of sexual minorities and help bring this group of users closer to (Croatian) public libraries by ensuring that libraries more adequately respond to their needs.     

Health information programming in public libraries: a content analysis

ABSTRACT

Health information programs, defined as library programs focusing on health-related topics, are an essential way for public libraries to reach out to their user communities, raising awareness of and interest in healthy lifestyle, promoting access to quality health information, and ultimately enhancing health literacy of the citizenry. This study presents a content analysis of the health information programs provided by a large urban public library system in the past year, seeking to strengthen the professional understanding of how public libraries can contribute to health literacy improvement through effective programming, and help other libraries gain insights on health information program planning and implementation.     

COLOR POEMS

ABSTRACT

The value, roles and responsibilities of public libraries have been articulated in a variety of ways, and today their exact nature continues to be subject to broad interpretation. This research approaches the subject from a historic perspective, using Ernestine Rose and her career at the New York Public Library to exemplify five propositions that lead to a value-centered understanding of public libraries as cultural institutions that engage considerable physical, economic, and moral resources to improve the social and intellectual capacity of their communities.     

Public Libraries and the Internet 2012: Key Findings,Recent Trends,and Future Challenges

Since 1994, 14 reliable national studies have provided longitudinal data revealing and analyzing trends in the public access computing, Internet access, and technology assistance and training that public libraries make available to the communities they serve. This article provides an overview of selected data from the 2012 study; examines major issues that have emerged from the data in the most recent studies; identifies key trends and changes in Internet-enabled services and resources provided by public libraries to their communities over the course of the 18 years of conducting the national surveys; and discusses selected future issues and challenges regarding public library Internet-enabled services.     

Lessons Learned from Katrina: What Really Matters in a Disaster

SUMMARY

While life's everyday occurrences in libraries leave us with a disaster situation, nothing could have prepared libraries for the magnitude of Hurricane Katrina. Devastating winds, flooding, and destruction to the area infrastructure required a type of response seldom experienced. By revisiting the responses in minor to catastrophic disasters, there are lessons to be learned. Some lessons serve as a source for prevention for potential disaster situations, rehabilitation in localized disasters, and reinvention when libraries are reduced to rubble.     

Consumer Health Materials for Lesbians,Gay Men,Bisexual and Transgendered People

Abstract

This article identifies the major health challenges of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgendered (L/G/B/T) communities, pointing out that each is faced with stigma and discrimination in the search for healthcare. Members of these communities are thus more likely to seek out and consult services offered by public libraries which identify and disseminate consumer health and self-care information appropriate to their needs. The article concludes with a bibliography of current sources of information-both print and electronic-that will interest the L/G/B/T health consumer.     

The Internet Access and Use in Public Libraries in Limpopo Province,South Africa

ABSTRACT

Citizens, including those living in poor and developing countries, need equitable access to information daily to satisfy their diverse and multiple information needs. In this information age and information economy era, easy and instant access to information and knowledge, which are inevitabilities for socio-economic development, cannot be overemphasised. With rolling out of public libraries even in disadvantaged rural communities due to the library conditional grant in South Africa, the study is aimed at investigating factors influencing the Internet access and use in public libraries in Limpopo. The study adopted a qualitative research approach. The twenty four users of three rural, semi-rural and urban public libraries were selected through convenience sampling. A well-placed government official of the Department of Sport, Arts and Culture was purposively selected. All informants were interviewed face to face to collect data. The study found that, although public libraries studied have networked computers for the Internet access and use, there are many challenges. The officials of the relevant department need to study the recommendations of this study to ensure that the people have digital access in public libraries to mitigate the diverse socio-economic challenges they are facing to improve their lives.     

Web 2.0 for Disaster Response and Recovery

Successful disaster response is an exercise in managing human resources under very difficult conditions. Catastrophic disasters can disrupt both the physical communication networks and the social networks critical to efficient response and recovery. While a well-designed disaster plan serves as a framework, it often requires communication and collaboration between responders to adapt it to the situation at hand. Displacement of library staff adds to the chaotic nature of post-disaster communications, increasing the need for collaborative Web spaces to adapt to changing situations. Using case studies of catastrophic disaster response at libraries, this article begins with an analysis of human resource management problems common to disaster response coordinators worldwide. It then discusses Auburn University Libraries’ uses of free Web 2.0 applications in support of library disaster preparation, response, and recovery. While Auburn University's location on the coastal plain of Alabama is vulnerable to both hurricanes and tornadoes, Auburn has so far only needed to respond to small-scale disasters. The devastation suffered by libraries in the paths of Hurricanes Katrina and Rita served to propel Auburn toward a more comprehensive preparedness stance. Disaster planning at Auburn has embraced Web 2.0 applications, such as Google Documents and Google Talk, to introduce redundant communication channels and to allow for efficient collaboration regardless of the location of library responders. By identifying key Web 2.0 applications and properties that are useful for response and recovery efforts, the research in this article may assist other libraries in improving their disaster preparedness.     

Expanding the Learning Community

Summary

While educational partnerships between academic libraries and public schools have taken many forms throughout the later half of the century, a less common approach to building learning communities is coordinated outreach visits by academic librarians to secondary schools to provide active-learning, hands-on workshops that include remote access to the wide range of information technologies and electronic resources available in academic libraries today. This article reviews the concept and practice of learning communities, establishes a connection between learning communities and information literacy, and offers an outreach model that promotes information literacy and expands the academic learning community to college-bound high school students.     

Library support for emergency management during the time of natural disasters: Through the lens of public library Twitter data

The public libraries in the Carolinas engaged with their communities using Twitter throughout the phases of Hurricane Florence in 2018. A total of 161 libraries in Carolinas were examined. The framework of crisis informatics, content analysis, and network analysis were applied to 738 Twitter posts from 17 libraries, which had Twitter presence, to understand interaction details between the libraries and communities that they serve. Findings include that the libraries shared a mixture of both disaster- and non-disaster-related information via their Twitter pages. The disaster-related tweets were mostly shared in the During (291 out of 349) and After (56 out of 349) phases. The number of general library-related tweets in the During phase dropped drastically compared to those in the Before or After phases. The libraries were also retweeting disaster-related tweets from various governmental agencies and NGOs to the community members in their social network. These findings indicate that the libraries switched their roles from a general services institution to an emergency information hub as the threat from the hurricane began affecting the communities. The knowledge gained from our study could be used to improve community resilience by further illuminating the role of public libraries as public infrastructures that host and facilitate the development of social capital during and after disaster events by becoming information and communication hubs.     

The Evolution of Law Library Support to Law School Administrative and Staff Offices: What We are Doing and Why

SUMMARY

This article looks at what law librarians are doing to support law school administrative and staff offices. The history of academic law libraries explains why this area of public services has been slow to develop. The article then discusses the type of services currently provided, including researching alumni for the alumni development staff, developing content for law school Websites, and serving on/assisting law school committees. The article concludes with a discussion of the costs and benefits of expanding services to these offices.     

Serving Pro Se Patrons

Abstract

Historically, non-lawyer patrons in law libraries have been viewed with discomfort, and library services, even in libraries open to the public, have been geared toward members of the legal community. However, changes in both the needs of the public and in the demographics of library patrons are challenging the traditional allocation of services in public law libraries. This article discusses the reasons for the traditional allocation of services, the cultural and economic forces that are bringing the public to law libraries in greater numbers, and new modes of service that can better meet the needs of public patrons.     

Centering Indigenous Knowledge: Three Southwestern Tribal College and University Library Collections

ABSTRACT

At tribal colleges and universities, libraries are challenged to serve Indigenous communities while supporting Western formal education. In this article, we examine three tribal higher education institutions in the southwestern United States: Diné College, the Institute of American Indian Arts, and Southwestern Indian Polytechnic Institute. In examining the collections and their use at these libraries, we find multiple strategies to “center” Indigenous knowledge despite most materials being written by and for non-Natives. We hope the strategies present here can inspire people at libraries of all types to consider ways to include the diverse perspectives of their own communities.