How to use this Page

When it comes to advocating for teen services, many of us have had to justify the importance of our role to our communities, library boards, and sometimes even fellow staff members; the unfortunate reality is that we will need to continue doing so for the unforeseeable future. With cuts to staffing and operating hours affecting how we do our day-to-day jobs, it can be easy to put advocacy on the back burner instead of keeping it at the forefront of all that we do. As we rush from program to program, patron to patron, we could all use more help advocating on behalf of the teens we serve. What better resource than the teens themselves to help promote libraries and, more specifically, teen services!

Recruiting teens who frequent the library, be it for programming, use of the collection, or homework help, to assist in promoting services that they use is a win-win situation. Teens can provide first-hand testimony that can be more effective than that of library professionals, and by empowering them to be heard, especially in something as crucial as this, we reinforce how much we value their input.

So, what are some of the ways that teens can become more involved in advocating for teen services? Check out some of the resources that follow:

• The soon-to-be-released Being a Teen Library Services Advocate by the esteemed Linda Braun (Neal-Schuman, 2012) is a comprehensive guide that covers everything a teen services advocate could need to address our value and importance, including a chapter devoted to teens advocating on behalf of their libraries.
• The YALSA wiki “Advocating for Teen Services in Libraries”
  is brimming with information, including tips and ideas, additional resources, and the spectacular “Speaking Up for Library Services to Teens: A Guide to Advocacy”. Many of the ideas that are aimed at library professionals can be easily adapted for teen participation, including creating pro-library T-shirts.
• Karen Jensen, the mastermind behind the awesome “Teen Librarian’s Toolbox” is a Teen Services Librarian whose The 2012 Project  seeks to collect 2,012 photographs of teens using their libraries in 2012 to demonstrate their value in their lives. Whether driven by teen librarians or the teens themselves, this is a great way for all involved to “show, not tell” how important our libraries are in a visual and creative way.

Whether grassroots or nationally organized, advocacy campaigns for teen services are important to our continued survival. With funding remaining in jeopardy across the country and library services facing cutbacks, now more than ever we must rally our teen support to help us so that we will be able to continue helping them. By getting today’s teens actively involved now, the future of teen services and libraries as a whole can only benefit.

Familiar with other teen-friendly advocacy resources? Please share them in the comments.

So let’s get a grasp on what exactly it is I’m talking about here.  Day of Dialog.  A day when School Library Journal and roughly 1.5 billion children’s book publishers (read: 16, give or take) get together and attendees (who are mostly children’s librarians and children’s booksellers) get to witness a variety of interesting panels and previews of upcoming children’s books for the Fall season.  It tends to be held on the Monday before BookExpo so that it doesn’t conflict with anything going on at that time.  And since my library was closed that day for it’s big time Centennial celebration, I thought to myself, “Why not go?  I could report on what went on and have some fun along the way.”

Of course I had forgotten that I would be typing all that occurred on Dead-Eye the Wonder Laptop: Capable of carrying at least two hours of charge in its battery . . . and then dying altogether.  So it was that I spent much of the day seeking out outlets and either parking myself next to them or watching my charging laptop warily across a crowded room.  Hi-ho the glamorous life.

I was hardly the only person reporting on the day.  Swift like the bunnies are the SLJ posts on the matter including the article BEA 2011: Paterson, Handler, Gidwitz a Huge Hit at SLJ’s Day of Dialog.

Day of Dialog is useful in other ways as well.  It means getting galleys you might otherwise not have access to.  It means sitting in a nice auditorium with a belly full of muffin.  Interestingly the only problem with sitting in the audience when you are pretty much nine months pregnant (aside from the whole theoretical “lap” part of “laptop computer”) is that you start eyeing the panelists’ water bottles with great envy.  I brought my own, quickly went through it, and then found myself wondering at strategic points of the day and with great seriousness “If I snuck onto the stage between speakers, do you think anyone would notice if I downed the remains of Meghan McCarthy’s bottled water?”  I wish I could say I was joking about this.

Brian Kenney, me boss o’ me blog and editor of SLJ, started us off with a greeting.  He noted that he had placed himself in charge of keeping everything on track and on schedule.  This seemed like a hazardous job because much of the day was dedicated to previews of upcoming books, and there is no good way to gently usher a sponsor off of a stage.  Nonetheless, Brian came equipped with a small bell.  Throughout the day that little bell managed to have a near Pavlovian influence on the panelists.  Only, rather than make them drool, it caused them to get this look of abject fear that only comes when you face the terror of the unknown.  For some of them, anyway.  Others didn’t give a flying hoot.

“It wasn’t wallpapering.”
Keynote Speaker Katherine Paterson

Luann Toth came after Brian to introduce our keynote speaker though, as she pointed out, “Does anyone really need to introduce Katherine Paterson?”  Point taken.  Now upon entering the auditorium this day, each attendee had been handed a signed copy of a new novel by Ms. Paterson and her h