A Win-Win Solution: Creative Problem-Solving • Johnson County, Kan.
Approximately 2,700 people reside in Johnson County nursing homes and assisted-living residences, and many are unable to visit a library. The Johnson County Library had long sought a way to provide library services to these residents, but outreach service is extremely labor-intensive and was consistently overlooked in the face of budget constraints or new branches or high-volume, in-library services.
Not only did these senior citizens not have immediate access to the library, they are also generally unaware of the limited outreach services that already existed for homebound patrons and for those with sight disabilities. The library provided a small, advisory mail service to provide books for those certified as homebound and was a referral agency for Talking Books and Audio Reader programs, both requiring certification of sight disability.
In order to promote awareness of these tax-supported services, expand the advisory mail service and provide programming for isolated residents, the library needed to add a new staff position.
Under budgetary constraints, no new positions were available in the new budget year and the prospects were bleak for finding a solution to the need for adult outreach services.
But in 1997, the position of youth services’ coordinator at the library became vacant. The Youth Oversight Committee, in January 1998, allowed the library to use the vacant position to create the outreach services’ coordinator position, dedicated to serving adults who are not able to go to the library. The duties of the youth services coordinator were reassigned to the nine professional youth services librarians holding masters degrees in library science.
The Outreach Services Department currently offers onsite programming to the more than 50 residential centers and nursing homes in the county, as well as to the Alzheimer’s Association and other similar organizations.
In 2001, the outreach services coordinator personally delivered 189 programs to 4,143 people, and three volunteers in her department presented 155 programs to 2,712 people. These programs are usually book talks, other literature-based presentations or Bi-Folkal Kit programs. A fourth volunteer assists the coordinator in delivering selections of library materials to centers, nursing homes and adult correctional residential centers.
Currently, the coordinator is developing a new Web page for senior citizens and their children to provide further information and guides for decision-making about senior living.
The Youth Oversight Committee, as a new committee, resulted in one extra day-long monthly meeting for the system to accommodate the group’s oversight functions.
Science Fair Saturdays • Martin County, Fla.
South Florida, home to four National Parks, desperately needs research scientists, passionate about their unique subtropical surroundings, to develop new ways to conserve these important ecosystems while allowing man and nature to prosper simultaneously. Science Fair Saturdays was designed to teach the children in South Florida how to design and conduct true scientific experiments relating to their natural environment.
The Martin County Public Library recognizes both the need for helping children enjoy creating a science fair experiment and using that scientific knowledge to preserve natural resources and biodiversity, and therefore implemented the Science Fair Saturdays program. Whenever possible, sessions included library books with stories or additional information related to the topic which children could check out and study in their homes.
The Science Fair Saturdays program focuses on educating youth in 4th through 6th grade in the areas of scientific research and conservation. Paralleling the local school district’s deadlines for science fair project plans, the program runs from September through November. It demonstrates to elementary age children how their natural world can be used to create innovative science fair projects.
Science Fair Saturdays help children begin to understand the applied science of conservation biology through projects such as making a pizza box into a solar oven, debating about tourism in the Everglades, creating sheets of real paper from plant materials, using specific plant parts to create homemade herbal remedies and planning a sustainable agriculture farm.
Stories and other nonfiction books relating to the subject are read aloud to the children to encourage an appreciation for the resources that their local library can provide them. During a Science Fair Saturday, students enjoy a complete experience of learning how our lives depend on scientific research and how scientific research depends on the library. Parents and children receive take-home information relating to each subject along with a list of possible science fair projects, which could be extensions of the topic discussed at that session.
Each Science Fair Saturday has a different theme. During the last program, the first Saturday topic was Alternative Energy and Solar Cooking. After discussing the effects of burning fossil fuels, the use of firewood as a principle source of life outside the United States, and alternative choices for heat and light, each child constructed a solar oven using pizza boxes.
Other Science Fair Saturday themes were: Ethnobotany, introducing the children to the medicinal and herbal properties of native plants and the importance of floral life; the Everglades, exploring the wetland ecosystems as well as tourism in the region; and sustainable agriculture. The program was conducted over a ten-week period and was held every other Saturday.
The costs incurred during the ten weeks of Science Fair Saturdays were limited. The entire cost was $124, most of which was supplies for the children. Nearly 50 adults and children attended the five programs throughout the ten-week period.
(Hats Off to … was compiled by Joseph Hansen, research assistant. For information regarding the Achievement Award program, please call (202) 661-8834.)
