Coming Back from Disaster: Progress to Date and Next Steps at Elliot Lake Public Library

In this article, I do two things. First, I describe and evaluate progress that has been made to date on implementing five recommendations made by the author to the leadership of Elliot Lake Public Library in 2014, intended to assist in disaster recovery efforts following the destruction of the library in an anthropogenic disaster in 2012. Second, I provide three revised recommendations, this time intended to assist library leadership address some continuing challenges that are preventing the complete recovery of the library, and ultimately, negatively impacting the effectiveness of the library within the community.     

The 2004 and 2005 Gulf Coast Hurricanes: Evolving Roles and Lessons Learned for Public Libraries in Disaster Preparedness and Community Services

SUMMARY

In the aftermath of the 2004 and 2005 Gulf Coast hurricanes, public libraries played many important roles in their communities, though ensuring access to vital information may have been the most critical service. This article explores the participation of public libraries in the recovery of their communities, the implications of this involvement for the place of public libraries in society, and lessons learned and recommendations for public library disaster planning. As this article demonstrates, public libraries successfully provided a range of disaster preparedness and recovery services that were not provided and could not have been provided by other government agencies.     

公共图书馆存在的理由:来自图书馆使命的注解

在世界范围内，几份重要的公共图书馆文献都将当代公共图书馆的使命界定为教育、信息服务、文化传播、促进社会和谐、培育信息素养、培养阅读兴趣、扫盲。文章首先考察了这些文献对公共图书馆使命的阐述，然后以经验研究（empmal research）发现为依据，考察了这些使命作为公共图书馆存在理由的有效性。研究发现，这些使命在当代政治和社会话语中经常出现，公众对它们也具有很高的需求，从这个意义上说，它们的确为公共图书馆的合理性提供着有效注解，但信息服务使命目前正受到互联网的挑战，扫盲及培养阅读兴趣的使命正在受到图书馆借阅量下滑趋势的挑战。     

Validity and Comparability of Public Library Data

No abstract available for this article.     

深化人工智能与图书馆更新的若干问题——再论人工智能与图书馆更新

文章从三个方面论述如何进一步深化人工智能与图书馆更新的问题,第一是信息文化环境持续向好,包括数字蝶变的重大机遇、城乡图书馆规模与密度、持续推出的人工智能政策举措、导入人工智能的技术自觉等;第二是发展人工智能服务的升级版,包括发展人工智能服务升级版是题中应有之义、构建全程智能服务链、助力图书馆服务提质扩容、赋予图书馆员超能力、赋能图书馆文化治理现代化等;第三是抗击新冠肺炎带来的启示,包括图书馆服务新蓝海、异地智能互联、图书馆服务的智性与韧性、读者服务应与时俱进等。     

公共图书馆治理结构及其优化策略——针对我国公共图书馆管理体制改革重点的分析

从公司法人治理结构分析公共图书馆治理结构的概念,认为公共图书馆治理结构有广义和狭义之分;公共图书馆治理结构由外部治理结构和内部治理结构组成。针对我国公共图书馆管理体制存在的弊端,提出未来改革重点:实行图书馆理事会制度,以此优化内部治理结构;实施图书馆行业管理制度,以此优化外部治理结构;合理设置建设主体,以此优化政府投入结构。最后得出的结论是:优化公共图书馆治理结构旨在理顺政府、图书馆行业协会、图书馆理事会、馆长及其副职、图书馆工作者、社会公众以及其他利益相关者之间相互制衡又相互协调的关系,以此建立民主、法治、透明、高效的公共图书馆管理体制。     

Connecting with Community: The Importance of Community Engagement in Rural Public Library Systems

While the topic of community engagement in public libraries has been researched in urban public library systems, little research explores community engagement in rural library systems. The Canadian province of Nova Scotia is largely rural and sparsely populated, with a dwindling and aging rural population. This report examines how community engagement can connect Nova Scotia’s rural public libraries with their communities. Librarians from eight predominantly rural library systems across the province were interviewed regarding the community engagement practices currently being used within their libraries and how their patrons (particularly youth) were reacting and responding to these practices. This article synthesizes the information derived from these interviews and provides a summary of the community engagement efforts being made throughout Nova Scotia. This study ultimately determines that while librarians in rural communities face a number of challenges when attempting to implement community engagement (e.g., small budgets and low staffing numbers), they remain extremely passionate about the topic and dedicated to serving their communities in the most meaningful and relevant way possible.     

Health Information and Health Literacy: Public Library Practices,Challenges, and Opportunities

This study investigated 18 libraries in two public library systems in Oklahoma to find out how they are addressing health literacy and facilitating access to consumer health information; how library staff members view their roles and responsibilities relative to health information and health literacy; what challenges libraries face; and what strategies are being used. Staff members recognized several challenges to providing health information and to developing programs, including staff and patron difficulties with reference interviews, and patron lack of awareness of library resources. Staff members often had only a partial understanding of health literacy, and were unaware of system strategies to address health literacy or provision of health information.     

公共图书馆与社区文化建设

通过对社区与社区建设的概念和内涵以及公共图书馆事业发展趋势的分析，提出了公共图书馆如何为社区文化建设服务的建议：为社区教育服务，建立社区分馆；为社区提供文献信息服务；为社区大众的健康休闲服务。从而更好地推动图书馆事业的发展，提高全民族人口素质。     

大型公共图书馆与社区图书馆的合作

本文在明确大型公共图书馆与社区图书馆范畴的基础上，针对这两类图书馆合作建设的共赢效果，探讨了两者合作建设的三种形式，并提出合作建设需注意的问题。     

澳大利亚公共图书馆的服务与管理

概括地介绍了澳大利亚的公共图书馆，包括国立图书馆、州立图书馆和一般的公共图书馆。文章以作者所工作的雅拉－墨尔本图书馆为具体例子，列举了图书馆的各项服务，并探讨图书馆的管理经验，特别是人员的结构和服务质量的衡量。     

Rural Public Library Outreach Services and Elder Users: A Case Study of the Washington County (VA) Public Library

ABSTRACT

Outreach services provided by rural public libraries are crucial to fulfilling their mission to provide information access to the widest array of user groups. Particular socioeconomic and geographic factors in rural areas present challenges of access to information resources, yet there exists only a limited amount of published scholarly work examining outreach services provided specifically by rural public libraries. This case study of outreach services to elder users offers contextual evidence for the centrality of social equity and access to the larger work of rural public libraries. Primary data were collected through four semi-structured focus group meetings conducted with elder users of the agency’s outreach services as well as through narrative interviews with six agency staff members. Principal findings showed that elder users had particular information needs related to entertainment and intellectual stimulation, challenges of transportation, and a limited access to technology and internet service. WCPL outreach services were found to positively impact the lives and general well-being of elder users by providing vital social and community connections and serving as a key link for elder users to an institution understood to be central to the life of the community in general.     

Public Library Services for Veterans: Selected Brief Case Studies

Public libraries across the country design and deliver programs for military veterans and their families, often collaborating with other organizations and agencies. The examples were assembled from both general and specialized interviews with librarians, and literature and Internet searches, with summaries of programs assembled and written by multiple researchers. The specific limitations on the listing in this article are clearly outlined in the first section. Overall, however, the article provides a good introductory overview of what’s going on in veteran’s programs and services in America’s public libraries in over seventy libraries in forty states. We hope this list of what public libraries have organized or are doing will supply other public librarians with ideas on how to provide new services or enhance their existing ones.     

Library Automation at The University for Development Studies: Challenges and Prospects

The automation of a library that basically aims at improving the management of the library's resources and increasing access to these same resources by users has caught on so well in the western world that virtually all academic libraries in that part of the world have automated most of their services. In Africa, however, several challenges are making it difficult for academic libraries to do the same, thus depriving them of the numerous touted benefits a library stands to gain from automating its services. The University for Development Studies (UDS) Library in Northern Ghana embarked on an automation project on one of its campuses that has thus far resulted in the full automation of the cataloguing and circulation operations. This article recounts the experiences of the Library in its bid to automate some of its services. The procedures that were followed, as well as the highlights of the automation, are recounted here. Lessons learned and challenges encountered are presented as an example for other academic libraries in Ghana, Africa, and other developing countries that have plans to automate.     

谈公共图书馆评估的体系缺陷与改进建议

通过分析第四次文化部对公共图书馆评估所存在的体系问题和原因,论述传递文献情报信息是公共图书馆的主要社会职能,中介性是否发挥到位应是评价服务效益的主要指标,提出科学匹配评估目的与方式、尝试用经济量化法评估公共图书馆服务效益的建议,认为科学有效的评估基础是文化主管部门开发并统一全国公共图书馆的业务管理系统,建立有效的数据共享机制和文献资源保障体系。     

西南地区公共图书馆服务管理的现状与分析

根据公共图书馆的基本功能、原则,借鉴国外图书馆的管理体制与经验,结合国内发达地区公共图书馆服务与管理的实践,针对西南地区公共图书馆服务管理现状与存在的问题,理清思路,提出解决问题的策略,规范西南地区公共图书馆服务管理的标准,促进西南地区图书馆事业的健康发展。     

Desired Characteristics of Management and Leadership for Public Library Directors as Expressed in Job Advertisements

ABSTRACT

Advertisements for public library directors can reflect the evolution of the public library environment as libraries adapt to changes related to funding and technology. No study has examined whether the skills and attributes desired of public library directors have changed over time and whether they are associated with the characteristics of management or leadership. Content analysis of public library director job advertisements from 2000–2011 revealed a closer association with management than leadership traits and an omission of characteristics like advocating, fundraising, being politically savvy, and having a vision needed to position the public library as an essential resource to stakeholders.     

图书馆的公共性质与公共目标

图书馆是人类公共需求的产物，最早的图书馆一经产生就具有公共性质、图书馆服务是一种公共物品，这种公共物品性质决定图书馆不能转制，变为企业走产业化道路。图书馆服务所追求的公共目标是平等与自由，这是社会公共目标在知识服务领域里的具体体现。     

Politicking for the Public Library

ABSTRACT

In today's current political environment raising support for millage renewals, bond campaigns or even millage continuations for public libraries is affected by national politics, and a tendency towards tax aversion on principle across the country. The lessons we can learn from the governing boards of small and rural public libraries are worth raising up to a greater national consciousness. Board governance, community consciousness, and facilities management are clear and logical tools that elected boards of public libraries can use to politick for support of libraries.     

New York State Public Library Systems and Their Services

This research revisited the conditions for establishing and funding public library systems in New York State Education Law and the Regulations of the Commissioner of Education, examined public library systems' organizational mission statements, and analyzed the public library systems' 2007–2011 five-year Plans of Service and 2008–2009 annual reports. The study found that public library systems in New York State generally provide services following the instructions in the state law and regulations and in their mission statements, although there are wide-ranging variations of actual service activities among public library systems based on their organizational and demographic characteristics.