Stories from the Field: Libraries are Innovating, Pivoting, and Collaborating

Library leaders around the country have been under extreme pressure to redirect resources and redesign services on the fly, all while keeping the health and safety of staff and patrons foremost in mind to avoid COVID-19 outbreaks and mitigate spread of the virus. Below we tell four stories to provide examples of how public libraries have innovated and built new programs and services, pivoted to move staff members and materials to better meet the challenges of the time, and collaborated with local organizations to ensure continued access—and where possible, expanded access—to the libraries’ offerings, online and off.

Even before COVID-19, library leaders at the Mandel Public Library of West Palm Beach were seeking to improve services for community members who were in economically dire straits and rarely came to the library. Not to be confused with Palm Beach—a city nearby known for its affluence—West Palm Beach has a poverty rate of 17.5 percent and a median household income of just over $51,000 a year.¹

Like many libraries around the country, the Mandel Public Library jumped at the chance to apply for new funding that came with the Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security (CARES) Act that Congress passed in late March 2020. Late last summer, it was awarded a grant to try a new method. With $99,447 from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS), it bought a hybrid minivan with a Wi-Fi emitter attached to the roof and developed a plan to bring the library to parks in three neighborhoods around the city. In addition to the van, the one-time grant enabled Mandel to purchase 12 Wi-Fi hotspot devices and 10 laptop computers and hire a staff member for community engagement through these mobile services.² The van brings the equipment and enables services to be set up outside each day. “It’s literally popping up library services with a tent and chairs, and, in addition, loaning the hotspots,” says Jennifer McQuown, Mandel Library’s youth services manager.

These mobile libraries are a modern iteration of the decades-old bookmobiles. But recently libraries have been modifying the concept to go well beyond books—bringing internet access, new forms of media, and access to technology training and social services. A Public Libraries article last summer highlighted examples in North Carolina, Maine, Colorado, and New Mexico, noting, “libraries are much more than can be contained in four walls.”³

Mobile libraries are also being designed to better support communities that have been long underserved. For Mandel Library, usage data from prior to the pandemic showed that in one neighborhood, for example, only 2 percent of elementary students had come to the library for homework help. To help more children, the mobile library will include a certified teacher in grades K–12 where needed. “We can offset the summer slide,” says director Lisa Hathaway. And, she adds, books and Wi-Fi are not enough. “For a lot of kids, they are hungry for knowledge—and for food.” Snacks will be provided too. Throughout the next year, Mandel will conduct formal and informal surveys to assess whether they are making a difference. “We may think we know what our community wants and needs but we need to ask them,” Hathaway says. “This is another way to get a hold on what people want from their public library during COVID and post COVID.”

Paying for a monthly internet bill is not the only barrier to using digital tools and online resources. People have to learn how to set up and log in to wireless networks, figure out drop-down menus and other software features, navigate through email inboxes and web browsers, and more. This kind of digital literacy usually requires access to people who show them the ropes—who, in the parlance of the National Digital Inclusion Alliance (NDIA), can be their Digital Navigators.⁴

To respond to the COVID-19 crisis, Salt Lake City Public Library built a digital navigator program last fall designed to help people in underserved areas get access to free, tailored technical assistance in English and Spanish. With a $411,084 grant from IMLS, via the CARES Act,⁵ the library has hired six Digital Navigators, three of whom are working with social service organizations in communities hardest hit by the pandemic and in economic distress. To tap into the service, people call the library’s hotline, answer a few questions about what they need, and are routed to a digital navigator best suited to support them.

The program, which plans to reach over 450 individuals over the year, is partnering with University Neighborhood Partners, which helps connect households to social services and helps families trying to figure out remote schooling during the pandemic; Catholic Community Services of Utah, which works with refugees and new immigrants on digital literacy and other skills; and Suazo Business Center, which focuses on services for people starting small businesses. It opened on December 1, 2020, after two months spent on hiring and training the Digital Navigators using resources available through NDIA, one of the project’s national partners. The Urban Libraries Council is spreading word about the digital navigator model across the country.

“We didn’t want to just do a device distribution program,” Shauna Edson, the library’s digital inclusion coordinator and director of the project, told us (though the program did receive funding to purchase 200 devices for distribution when needed). Nor was there any way to create a computer lab model, given that buildings were closed. But this way, people are matched up with someone whose sole job is to spend time with them, walking them through how to use new tools. As Edson puts it, “they are not just rushed through a public computer lab session in 15 minutes.”

Janie Hermann, the public programming librarian at Princeton Public Library, knows how to pivot. At the heart of one of New Jersey’s most densely populated areas, the Princeton Public Library sees about 860,000 visitors who attend more than 1,300 programs a year—during a typical year. When buildings shut down last March, Hermann and her staff were forced to pivot their programming online to keep pace with the high demand. Then, a few months later, they pivoted again, this time to new digital platforms that could sustain the volume of people engaging with the library’s online programming. Finally, in the fall of 2020, Hermann realized visitors to the library had become adept at using the technology but were still craving the social interaction of in-person events. Once again, the library pivoted, from primarily passive, “sit and get” programming to providing additional interactive and community-building events, such as podcast discussion groups and coding classes. Today, the library offers hundreds of fully online, interactive programs each month, with audiences steadily growing.

“Our existing partnerships with local schools, community organizations, and arts programs in Princeton made most of our programming possible,” says Hannah Schmidl, the library’s public humanities coordinator. They “have given us the support we needed when everything went virtual.” In addition to funding from local organizations, Princeton has also made use of CARES Act dollars and one-time IMLS funding awarded to the New Jersey State Library for all NJ public libraries to gain access to some of the technology it needs to sustain online programming, such as advanced Zoom accounts and other paid platforms. And while these influxes of cash have made some technological advances possible, they also mean that the library’s continued use of these platforms hinges somewhat on future funding. “Part of the reason we’ve used so many platforms is because we don’t want to become too reliant on any one of them,” Hermann says. “We don’t know when funding is going to run out and we’ll stop being able to afford them.”

Hermann and Schmidl advise that libraries plan for every scenario and remain cognizant of the needs of the community. New technology brings learning curves, adjustment periods, and inevitable technical difficulties. But above all else, Hermann says, the focus must remain on our community. Each pivot in the course of Princeton’s response to pandemic challenges has been in direct response to the needs of their clients. As she puts it, “without the community, we wouldn’t be here, and without listening to and pivoting toward their needs, we wouldn’t be doing our job.”

Like most schools and libraries around the country, Catawba County Library System, located in a rural area north of Charlotte, NC, closed down all in-person activities in late March. Unlike most libraries, it reopened just one month later. While groups around the country shifted their focus entirely to online programming, Catawba County libraries moved many of their programs outside. While some programs did shift online, library leaders moved other ventures outdoors, from children’s programming to book pick-up and voting information sites where guests could remain masked and socially distanced. Since the start of the pandemic, the county system has met thousands of library patrons outside the walls of its buildings.

Jenny Gerami-Markham, assistant director of the library system, attributes everything this shift to the library’s existing partnerships and culture of collaboration. “Nothing we do happens without working together.” Markham says. “From partnerships with the health department, to the Alzheimer's Association, to local schools and museums—we’re all plugged into the community in unique ways and it takes all of us working together to make it happen.” Library leaders have also strived to collaborate with each other. As they see it, engaging all library system staff is not only a necessary way to retain personnel during a critical time, but also it strengthens the quality of programming.

Building and maintaining these types of partnerships and collaborative environments is not always easy, especially during a global pandemic. According to Markham, Catawba County leaders have made a critical effort to look for the needs in the community first, and then build programming around what they learn. This sort of community-first approach not only helps the library ensure that it is meeting the needs of the community, but it also garners buy-in among external organizations. Among so many constantly shifting challenges and priorities this past year, collaboration and community remain two constants for Catawba County.