Marketing a High School Library
Teachers and Librarians get to go through a classroom evaluation several times each school year. This is my fifth year as a School Librarian at a BOCES program. For those that do not know what a BOCES program is here is the definition from New York State School Boards Association:
“BOCES stands for Board of Cooperative Educational Services. BOCES are public organizations that were created by the New York State Legislature in 1948 to provide shared educational programs and services to school districts“ ("New York," n.d.).
To my knowledge, there is one other BOCES in New York State and BOCES are not required to have a School Librarian. Since I am the only Librarian working at my BOCES I often have multiple administrators that the Library falls under. Next year I am told that the Library will fall under the Curriculum Administrator. This is the same person that has been doing my teacher evaluation each year already. I also have School Library Services that asks for a Member Plan to be filled out every 4 years, next year that may switch to yearly. You may be asking am I reading the right article? The Title is Marketing a High School Library. Before a recent classroom observation, one of my administrators had a moment to talk about connecting with more of the programs at CiTi and where I should be concentrating my efforts. A few points that I agree with such as I am quiet with people I am not as familiar with. True this year but not in past years. So I will work on that. Since I am a quieter person at this point I need to be more outgoing and ask to present at Faculty meetings. Presentations of 5 minutes or less. The point being I need to market the library better moving forward……..
I used to see teachers in the building all the time but then the library was moved to a building next to the main one. Great space but not so great for making connections. So marketing is important.
So what do I do to market the library already that have had some good results?
Weekly newsletter - using Smore.com I put out a weekly newsletter highlight service and/or new items in the library. I also include PD opportunities that teachers can attend that I will also be attending, in the hopes that we can team up. ("Smore," n.d.)
Walking - Yep that is right. At the end of the day and I am getting ready to leave I have changed my route out of the building so that I may run into teachers. This is actually going out of my way since I am quite close to the parking lot. Improvement to connections but not enough.
How to videos: I have had limited success with my FAQ videos and DIY videos. I have a YouTube channel that I post on the Library website. It gets some use but could be much better utilized. I need better videos!
Technology Committee - I am on the Technology Committee and I do reach teachers from across the programs this way. Plus I have connected with our Technology Director who is now advocating for the library when possible and appropriate at meetings.
What I tried that did not work:
Walking Lunchtime - I tried at lunchtime to walk from my end of the campus to the faculty room, but that leaves the library unattended and people stop and say they were just heading over to the library. I never actually make it to the faculty room for lunch. I also had to bring a note pad to take notes which I almost always forgot to bring with me.Webinars - I use Zoom meeting to reach out to teachers that are either at another location or want an easy way to share their screen to figure out a problem. I have a Zoom session that runs on school days. Not one teacher has used that option. Also, I had only one successful webinar and that is when I was hosting but one of our vendors was presenting.
What to try next:
Mobile Library Cart: I have put together a mobile library cart with games, coloring/sticker books, and magazines. The idea is that students that finish lunch early can look through the magazines and play a quick game. This will help with lunchroom behaviors and market the library to students. The cart will also offer books for students to check-out as soon as I can get my mobile library catalog fully functional. I will be doing this 2 days a week and I am looking for another person to help with the other 3 days of the school week.Mobile Library Cart Part II: Another cart is being set up with Fiction titles sorted by Genre. The point of this cart is to take the library to the classrooms. Since I am in a different building many of the classes skip going to the library. I was asked if it was possible to have a mobile library come to the classroom for book checkouts. I’m game for this I can reach the students on a regular basis that want to borrow books and don’t get opportunities to come to the library, but I can also reach those reluctant to come to the library.
Weekly Newsletter additional: I use the paid version of Smore so I get all the bells and whistles. I have noticed that even though I send out the newsletter using Smore’s mailing list option people are not actually reading it. Our Tech Department has started labeling emails as “External Email” that are from outside sources which have led to people just deleting instead of looking closer at the email. I have taken to also email the link to the newsletter to the “staff” list which is everyone no matter their job vs Smore mailing list which is just teachers and administrators. I do run the risk of people getting frustrated with the weekly email from the library. So I will be printing some of the newsletters and putting them in teacher’s mailboxes and try and make the connection between print and digital versions of the newsletter.
This, unfortunately, is not enough. In my first 4 years of working at this BOCES I had administrators that asked the question “have you worked with the library” when talking to teachers. I know this because I would soon afterward have the teacher in the library asking questions and would say their admin had mentioned the library. Here it is March and I have had only one teacher say admin mentioned the library.
I am looking for new and better ways to market the library. Please add a comment to this post to share what you are doing to market your High School Library.
References
New York State School Boards Association. (n.d.). Retrieved March 26, 2019, from https://www.nyssba.org/about-nyssba/boces-fact-sheet/
Definition of a BOCES
Smore. (n.d.). Retrieved March 26, 2019, from https://www.smore.com/app
