April 10, 1996 - inner adult and storytimes

Over the past several years, many people have written books and articles about their "inner child."

In part, this really bothers me. At some point in our lives, we need to stop combing the ashes of our past, and GROW UP. Or let's put it this way: we also need to discover our inner adult. There is one, you know.

Yet I also recognize that in many respects, adults are a lot like children. I got to thinking about this after I met several high-powered state librarians who had started out as children's librarians.

Every one of these librarians is highly skilled in groups. At any big meeting, they greet everybody by name. They match the pace and presentation of their points to the unique concerns and styles of the people present. They keep everybody focused and involved.
I can't help but think that they got so good at this because they were children's librarians first.

In story hours, you learn the children's names because that makes each child feel welcome, acknowledged.

You learn to spot potential problems early and act on them. When a child's attention has wandered, you refocus your method of presentation, or briefly interrupt things to remind everybody of the ground rules.

You learn to project enthusiasm. Good children's librarians make their customers happy: they have a sincere and infectious love for their work.

Finally, the best children's librarians maintain an essential respect to each individual.

Even those of who have discovered our inner adult still believe the sweetest sound is the sound of our own names. We appreciate it when people remember our favorite games. We also understand that every now and then a little reminder is necessary to keep us within the bounds of civility.

We like to hang around enthusiastic people. And all of us, child or grown-up alike, possess a basic dignity too often ignored or undermined.

In short, the skills of leadership, so vital in any organization, translate pretty well from the story hour to the state house.

But I like to think there's even more to it than that. Children's librarians tell stories. They are immersed in literature, constantly probing for the powerful tale, the engaging style, the right mix of character and action.

Leadership is these things, too.

So after all that wind-up, here's the pitch. If you find yourself in situations with children -- as a teacher (full-time, part-time, or volunteer), as a daycare provider, as a parent or grandparent, or as anybody who is just looking for a chance to gain some skills, some practice, or some direction in the wonderful pastime of telling tales -- here's an opportunity.

On Saturday, April 27, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the Parker Library, our own master storyteller Priscilla Queen will conduct a workshop. All are invited. You should register first, though. Call 841-3503 (the front desk number) or 841-6942 (Priscilla's phone) to do that, or for any questions.

And remember: learning to be a good storyteller isn't only useful with children.

April 3, 1996 - CUI Versus GUI and Document Quality

Like most business people these days, library staff depends on personal computers. We do what most folks do with them: word processing, spreadsheets, telecommunications, the occasional database, and the even more occasional graphic, in about that order.

According to the spec sheets, every time we buy a new computer, it is far more powerful than any of the computers we have bought before. But the work we do -- on the whole -- is the same.

It makes you wonder: is the quality of our work any different? Has the more powerful tool made a difference, or is it all just marketing hype?

Let's take word processing. For a long time, library staff had standardized on Microsoft Works for DOS. It came with just one manual, and did pretty much everything we wanted to do with a computer. Some of us still use it. Oh, and the program required 640K of memory, would run off a 1.2 megabyte floppy, and cost $89 per machine.

But DOS programs are passe'. Now everything is "graphical." In most respects, the way most new programs work -- whether they be for Windows 3.1, Windows 95, or the Macintosh -- is a whole lot like the way Works did. (That's because Works adopted a non- graphical version of the Macintosh menu system called CUI -- the Common User Interface.)

But these new programs are just different enough -- with file formats, fonts, borders, screen colors and the like -- that we're constantly having to move our old files into a new environment, and figure out the new way of doing things we were doing just fine before.

Now let's go back to the issue of quality. Back in 1990, I happened across a very interesting study. A group of college freshman were tested on "document quality." Half of them wrote using DOS-based word processors. The other half used word processors on the Macintosh system. The split was deliberate and controlled. The idea was to find out which approach to writing resulted in the better document.

The findings were surprising. The study, conducted by one M.P. Halio and summarized by a later researcher, concluded that "Macintosh writers tended to use a popular style -- brief paragraphs, short sentences, and simple words, including slang and colloquialisms. Macintosh users also chose less sophisticated topics, but they were more creative than IBM writers in formatting and illustrating their texts."

In other words, the Mac users mistook writing that looked good for good writing.

At the time, this filled me with a great deal of self- righteousness. After all, I used DOS word processors myself.

Alas. Another, far more rigorous and exhaustive study published in 1994 proved that in the short run (six weeks into a business communications class), yes, writers using the "character-based interface" of most DOS-based word processors seemed to demonstrate superior ratings in the areas of content and "mechanics" -- technical proficiencies.

But after five more weeks -- brace yourself -- all the differences disappeared. According to the author of the study, Shirley Kuiper, (in "Impact of computer-user interface on document quality," appearing in the Journal of Business Communications, April 1994, volume 31, number 2, beginning on page 125), "Overall GUI [graphical user interface] users performed neither better nor worse than CUI [character-based user interface] users."

So there you have it. We've all bought new machines. We've all struggled to learn new software. Most of this software requires roughly 16 times as much memory and hard disk space as the old software. The time it takes to load the program, or to print a document, is about the same as it used to be. The software cost has doubled.

To be fair, other studies suggest that the GUI has made us more productive. It takes less time to train people. It takes a little less time to generate the copy. People tend to LIKE their computers a little more.

But the quality of our documents -- WHAT we're saying as opposed to how it looks -- is unchanged.

March 27, 1996 - Gold stars, Service, and Public Surveys

A friend of mine runs her own business from home. A couple of months ago, she got into a slump. She still had plenty of business, but she just didn't think she was doing her best work.

Most of us get into these kinds of troughs every now and then. But my friend did something about it that was surprisingly effective -- and surprisingly simple.

First, she put a big calendar right in front of her desk -- the wall-mounted kind, with big, clear numbers. Every time she raised her eyes, there was the calendar. At the end of each day, she made a decision. If she'd gotten a lot done, she stuck a gold star on the day. If she hadn't, she didn't.

Before very long, whenever she was about to get up and sharpen her pencils for the fifth time, she found herself asking, "Wonder if I'll give myself a gold star today?" Then she set down the pencils and did something more productive.

Before long, she was putting up gold stars almost every day.

Clever, isn't it? It doesn't take somebody with a whip at your back to make you work smarter. It doesn't take a $500 a day consultant. It just takes something simple, like your own opinion of yourself.

Friedrich Nietzsche, the German philosopher, once wrote, "If you train your conscience, it blesses you as it hurts you."

It happens that one of the things the Douglas Public Library District will be doing this year is a community survey. The survey is a part of our long range planning process: as we set new directions for the library, we want to touch base with the people who will pay for the service.

And speaking of service, that's my essential concern as a library director. I am, after all, a public servant, as are all library employees. As we move into our next planning period, how do we make sure that we are all doing our best work? How do we maintain the highest possible levels of service?

The more I think about this, the more I think the best way is to try to find something as straightforward as what my friend did.

Suppose that for a couple of weeks out of every year I put some kind of quick tally sheet next to each staff workstation. Whenever a patron came up and asked for something, and the transaction concluded, the staff member had to put a tally in one of two columns: "great service," or "not great." Nobody would see this tally but the employee. It wouldn't be collected.

But if you believe in the innate honesty and intelligence of your staff - and I do - this might be just about all that's needed to cause a real jump in service quality. Part of that has to do with staff members holding themselves more accountable, like my friend.

But the other part has to do with discovering problems. Maybe the staff person COULDN'T deliver good service because the library didn't carry something people kept asking for.

Here's another twist on the same idea. Suppose that we set up a little table by the exits of the library. On the table would be a bowl of poker chips, and two cans. One would be labeled, "I got good service;" the other, "I wish!" Every time a patron walked out, they could record the quality of their experience with the library. Now THAT could give a branch manager some interesting data.

Service is important. Public institutions should be responsive. It could be that some simple ideas like these - inexpensive, unobtrusive, based on the notion that staff and patrons both have a good idea of what good service means - are all that it would take to earn enough gold stars for everyone.

March 20, 1996 - Arbor Day, the Great Waukegan Carwash Robbery

At last the truth can be told. I was one of the two Caped Avengers who thwarted the great Waukegan Car Wash Robbery.

My crime fighting identity in those days was "Red Diamond." My partner and mentor was Mike Milligan, "The Blade." I was 10. He was 12.

It started out like any other night, with our usual patrol of the block. This was no small task. Our block had houses on two sides of the long rectangle; the other two sides had a host of little shops. There was a McDonald's, a fish store, a gas station, a laundry, a factory, a liquor store, a barber shop, a grocery store -- and a car wash.

The patrol took about an hour. We did it every night, rain or shine.

We knew something was different as we crossed over the laundromat -- a reflected light where we were used to darkness. We were on the roof of the building, just coming up on the rickety wooden plank we placed to let us climb over to the car wash. Then we heard it: the tinkle of broken glass. Two low voices.

The Blade motioned me closer. Carefully, we inched above the front door. We heard: "Where's the cash drawer?" "Behind the counter." "It's locked!" "Here, try this!" Then we heard banging.

It was the moment we had been waiting for, all of our lives, the moment we had trained for.

First we both stomped around on the roof. Below, the men froze. "I called the police!" the Blade shouted. "I know who they are!" I piped. Then we looked at each other and grinned.

Then we stopped grinning. A head popped up at one end of the building. "It's some kids," said a voice. "Grab them!" said the other voice. The first man started scrambling up.

The Blade and I ran back to the plank, danced across it, then kicked it free. We could hear the man swear behind us, and start looking for a way down.

We tore across the roof, dropped along a gutter. Then, we dived into our escape path, a route worked countless times in the dark. Through the alley, over the picket fence, along the brick wall, and finally, a leap into space, high above the back yards of our neighbors ...

There were three willow trees. We hit one, swung along a high branch, connected to the next tree, swung, grabbed for the next, and landed running. In just minutes, we were safe.

The next day, we huddled over the newspaper headline: "CAR WASH ROBBERY INTERRUPTED." The store owner expressed gratitude for whatever mysterious event had scared off the robbers. Nothing had been stolen.

Our eyes narrowed. We clasped hands. "The Blade," I said. "Red Diamond," he replied. The Mystery Men of Waukegan.

The point of this story is, I trust, perfectly plain. If it hadn't been for those willow trees, evil might have triumphed.

And that brings us to Arbor Day.

See elsewhere in this issue for the complete list of Arbor Day activities. But I would be remiss if I didn't highlight two of them.

First, at 9 a.m., April 20, we will be planting trees and shrubs at the new Parker Library. We are looking for both volunteers and donations, although the Town of Parker and the Friends of the Parker Library have already made significant commitments. The same morning, our own storyteller, Priscilla Queen, will entertain the children with more tales related to trees. The Parker Senior Center will provide refreshments.

Second, Larkspur will be participating in this countywide event for the first time this year -- planting trees along the inner road of the park.

Again, do look elsewhere in the paper for more opportunities to participate in the planting of trees, or for a complete list of contacts. And this year, vow to help.

Why? For truth. For justice. For the American Way.

March 13, 1996 - Zuni Librarian

Last week, I gave a talk on censorship to some New Mexico librarians. After the talk, I was approached by the librarian for the Zuni tribe -- one of the Pueblo peoples. The librarian (she was white) described a situation new to me.

The story starts a long time ago. Between the years of about 1870 and 1917, white photographers and anthropologists, fascinated by Native American religions, took many photographs of various ceremonies, artifacts, and places.

Over the past twenty years, many of these photographs have been re-released in various publications, most of them by university presses. They have sparked a fire storm of controversy.

Here's the perspective of the librarian. "Young people began coming into the library to ask for some of these books. I bought them. Almost immediately, the tribal elders complained. Some of the ceremonies described in the books were sacred, they said. Nobody was supposed to know about them unless they'd been initiated."

And yet, she went on, "the kids are desperate to find out about their history and their beliefs. None of the adults takes the time to talk to them."

On the plane back from the talk, I mentioned this to the person next to me. It turns out she knew someone who had worked with the Navajo Nation. She described a story of an anthropologist interviewing a tribal elder about some religious beliefs. Every now and then, the Native American would excuse himself, enter a small room, then return with an answer. Finally, the anthropologist asked him just whom he was consulting. Silently, the Navajo disappeared, then returned with a book -- published by the Oxford Press, and based on research from a century earlier. The point of the story was that if anthropologists hadn't documented that knowledge, it would have been lost altogether.

But there's another perspective. Clearly, the living chain of memory, an oral tradition from one generation to the next, has been broken. But it wasn't broken by Native Americans. Various white peoples -- from the Spanish to the English to the white Americans born on this soil -- completely overwhelmed, have all but decimated, many of the cultures that existed before theirs in this land.

To the people living on reservations, this latest round of publications -- even if published in the spirit of respect, and in some cases of frank admiration -- smacks of voyeurism and exploitation. There is something profoundly humiliating about having to learn about your past from the very people who destroyed it.

The question put to me by the New Mexico librarian was, "How should I respond to the elders?" I've given the question a lot of thought since then.

On the one hand, ignorance can't be the right choice. The white librarian may be right: these books may be the only way the young Zuni can learn about their heritage. It would be too ironic if any interested party EXCEPT the young people of the Zuni tribe had access to this information.

On the other hand, she might be wrong. It could be that a way of life can only survive if the chain is mended, if it becomes a living link, spoken at just the right time. It's hard for an outsider to judge that.

Here's the answer I gave her: I don't know.

March 6, 1996 - Computers in Libraries Conference

I've spent the past week at a conference called Computers in Libraries. I was at the very first one of these 11 years ago. Back then, almost 400 people showed up, from all over the country.

This year, there were over 2000.

Unlike most of the conferences I go to, I didn't know a lot of the people. It's not the sort of gathering that pulls in directors and journalists. Most of the people are the foot soldiers of the information age -- the reference librarians and media center supervisors and computer technicians. So instead of a lot of high-falutin' philosophy, they talk nuts and bolts. They come to the conference because there are things they need to find out about.

And in general, what DO they need to know? Based on the presentations, they need to know about the World Wide Web.

Here's the good news: librarians, it turns out, are really very good at organizing information. Some of them seemed to be surprised at this: some dazzlingly well-thought-out web pages were trotted out by state library staff and librarians. You could see the eyes popping, followed by a hasty scribbling of the Internet address, followed by a thoughtful look that meant, "Hmm. I could do that."

They will, too.

The bad news: it wasn't until the last day of the conference that some of the speakers tried to put this in perspective -- just where does automation fit in the larger scheme of library services? I mentioned a couple of weeks ago that my job was to talk about what is "too fast" for the patron.

Here's what I said. I think most of our patrons fall into one of four main categories.

1. "The library will never be too fast for me." (I actually got this as an e-mail message from a patron. And he's probably right.)

2. "It's not too fast if I don't HAVE to use it." Another echoed: "The first time, it was sort of interesting when a staff member showed me how to look something up. But the second time, it WASN'T interesting. When I call a plumber, he doesn't make me look at his wrenches." A third person drove the point home: "If these computers make your job easier, great! As long as the reference librarian will still find it for me! And smile!"

3. Here's a different take. "I went to one of your computer classes, and loved it," said one woman. "But the next week, the whole screen was different. Once I get it figured out, don't change it."

4. Finally, here's a similar response from someone playing at our Internet station. "There's too much. Can't you just highlight the things that are useful?" This comment highlights the need for what librarians traditionally do best: identify credible resources, then make it easy to find them.

My staff, incidentally, was terrified when they heard I was going to this conference. They were afraid I'd get hyped up and launch us into yet another wild endeavor.

But ultimately, here's what I learned:

Based on circulation statistics and public surveys, it's clear to me that our patrons still prefer a physical, rather than a virtual, place, and they still want an object -- a children's picture book, a non-fiction title, an adult fiction title, a video, or an audio, in that order. I would predict that this general pattern of use will endure for some time -- as long as we continue to give our patrons a choice.

That doesn't mean that we won't continue to offer a good mix of new resources. Right now, all of our automation expenditures accounts for about 3% of our annual expenditures. And that strikes me as just about right.

February 28, 1996 - computers in libraries too much?

As I write this, I'm off for a week-long conference called "Computers in Libraries." As always before a long trip, I'm grappling with an essential question: which books should I pack?

There are many dimensions to the question. This trip, I have two main concerns. First, how much will they weigh? (I've got to lug them in and out of airports.) Second, can I find something that will go the distance, something that will both last 5 days AND engage me enough to partially address the absence of wife and children?

The more I've thought about this, the more I've learned about myself. I've decided that I read for just four reasons.

Here's one of them: I gotta. This is perfectly captured by the protagonist in science fiction writer Robert A. Heinlein's "Glory Road," first published in 1963: "The truth is, I've got a monkey on my back, a habit worse than marijuana though not as expensive as heroin. I can stiff it out and get to sleep anyway, but .... The fact is I am a compulsive reader. Thirty-five cents' worth of Gold Medal Original will put me right to sleep. Or Perry Mason. But I'll read the ads in an old Paris-Match that has been used to wrap herring before I'll do without."

Here's the second reason: to share. For the past 8 years I've read children's literature aloud to my children, nearly every day. Maddy is our first child (8 years old now). These days, we're reading the American Girls series and Beverly Cleary's Ramona Quimby books.

Then came Perry (just 2 years old). We're starting all over again with some of the favorites -- "Good Night Moon" by Margaret Wise Brown, to name one of the very best. But Perry has a different take on some of these things. In "Good Night Moon" he looks for the mouse. Maddy looked at the colors.

There may be better moments in life than having the flesh of your flesh snuggle up against you and say, "book!" But there aren't many.

Here's the third reason: to dream. Some folks call it "escapism." But this suggests that reading is running from life. That's wrong.

I think that when people dive into a work of fiction -- whether it be science fiction, or mystery, or historical romance, or best seller -- they're not running away from anything. Instead, they're looking to live in a world where things happen because they are meant to happen, a world where the logic is clear. They are looking for something more than the random incidents that make up so much of our waking lives.

In just the same way, we close our eyes each night, and our marvelous minds generate stories -- little plays in which everything stands for something. We wake up refreshed, a little wiser, a little more hopeful than we went to sleep, whether we realize it or not.

The fourth reason is to learn. There are times when I am overwhelmed by my own ignorance. I work in a library, and just to walk from my office to the circulation desk -- a distance of a few hundred feet -- is a profoundly humbling experience.

Most of us, even if willing and able to dedicate a lifetime to concentrated effort, won't read as much as a single range of shelves.

One shelf is 3 feet long. A range -- both sides of a set of shelving, or an "aisle" -- equals approximately 84 shelves.

Yet one range contains such a small portion of what the human race has so painfully discovered in its recorded history.

I've settled on two books for my trip. One is "Future Shock" by Alvin Toffler. I bought it for two bucks from Hooked on Books in Castle Rock. The second is "Future Libraries" by Walt Crawford and Michael Gorman. I've decided this trip should be educational.

Here's hoping to learn something.