Category: Public Services

Library Patron Loneliness: Strategies for Building Community and Connection

Editor’s Note: This guest post has been authored by Alejandro Marquez (Science and Engineering Librarian at the University of Denver Libraries) and Brady Niemitalo Woods (Patron Training Specialist at Jefferson County Public Library, Colorado).

The fall semester started recently, marking the beginning of a new school year. Imagine a new student at a college or university who has come from another state. Their social life will completely change. They have left their home community and don’t know anyone. This adjustment can be challenging, even in the best circumstances. Yet this student brings many identities—they are nonbinary and not white. Think about what this student might feel and experience. They likely feel some fear, hope, and excitement but also a little lonely.

Loneliness is a universal part of the human experience. In 2022, upwards of 42% of US adults experienced it, highlighting a substantial public health crisis. Since then, loneliness has been increasing. The U.S. Surgeon General stated that loneliness is just as bad as smoking fifteen cigarettes a day. Loneliness not only impacts mental health but also physical health. Loneliness is more than being alone; it’s a feeling of disconnectedness. It can affect people of all ages and backgrounds, and its impact on mental and physical health is well-documented. Chronic loneliness can lead to depression, anxiety, worse health outcomes, and increased mortality rates.

While loneliness is a common experience, it is not evenly distributed. Some are more likely to experience loneliness. Factors include low income, parenthood, singleness, and age. LGBTQ people, minorities, and women are more likely to experience loneliness than the average.

Libraries have long served as community spaces where people can connect, learn, and engage with others. Yet in a digital age, the sense of isolation among library users has become a growing concern. In this blog post, we explore the issue of loneliness in libraries and discuss strategies for librarians to address it.

Strategies for Combating Loneliness

1. Create Welcoming Spaces: Ensure library environments are warm, inviting, and inclusive. Comfortable seating, designated social areas, and welcoming signage can help people feel comfortable. Research shows that academic libraries can promote friendship. Noisy areas where people can hang out and interact are key. Welcoming spaces also involve staff participation. Library staff engaging proactively with users can go a long way toward addressing loneliness. Simple gestures, such as striking up conversations or recommending books based on shared interests, help foster meaningful connections.

2. Offer Diverse Programming and Collections: Provide a variety of programs and events that appeal to different interests and demographics. From book clubs and storytimes to workshops and cultural events, diverse programming can attract various participants and create connections. Library Journal suggests some creative ideas, including workforce preparation, food, and community art. Users should feel that they matter. Crucial to this is creating collections and services where people see themselves. Both content and media matter; graphic novels, film, print books, e-materials, and audiobooks can all be popular with different individuals. Representation and accessibility are both crucial: seeing oneself as mattering to and feeling able to participate in the community is an important step to addressing loneliness.

3. Facilitate Peer Groups: Establish peer groups focused on specific topics or shared experiences, such as knitting, book clubs, board games, parenting, or job searching. These groups provide opportunities for individuals most at risk of loneliness and facing similar challenges to connect, share resources, and provide emotional support to one another. Groups may consider partnering with campus organizations such as career centers and mental health centers to provide library spaces and share handouts, library guides, and/or bookmarks.

4. Promote Digital Literacy: Offer digital literacy workshops and resources to help users navigate online communication tools and social media platforms. By empowering individuals to connect virtually, libraries can expand social opportunities for those who face barriers to in-person interaction. Regardless of age, many library users struggle with a range of computer skills, including: computer fundamentals, artificial intelligence like Chat-GPT, and citation managers like Zotero. Classes addressing misinformation and classes about digital privacy and cybersecurity are especially important for building healthier relationships online.

5. Collaborate with Community Partners: Partner with local organizations, schools, and businesses to expand the reach of library programs and services. Collaborative efforts can enhance resources, increase visibility, and attract new audiences to library events. Strong partnerships between academic and public libraries can be particularly useful, connecting individuals with more expansive collections, a wider range of programming, and opportunities to connect. A wide range of partnerships increases the potential for fostering interaction. Washington State Library, for instance, supports libraries making space for groups playing the popular roleplaying game, Dungeons & Dragons (D&D). Networks can create positive feedback loops, creating and sustaining communities that address loneliness.

6. Provide Outreach Services: Extend library services beyond the physical building through outreach initiatives aimed at reaching marginalized or isolated populations. Many libraries offer programs to welcome students to campus early in the fall. This is an excellent way to build relationships, as well as introduce students to library services. Creating timely programming and events can also be used as opportunities to introduce students to the library. Programs might include Love Your Library (for Valentine’s Day), a wall to create blackout poems for National Poetry Month, or de-stress stations for finals.

Readers may rightfully worry about mission creep. As Fobazi Ettarh argues, vocational awe is often used as a justification for this creep. This leads to “more and more responsibilities and less time in which to accomplish them.” While loneliness harms people, library workers should be careful not to take on additional roles in addressing it. In addition, library workers face challenges to address loneliness such as limited resources, stigma associated with seeking help, and the digital divide.

It is critical that libraries serve our communities without taking on additional responsibilities. Fortunately, addressing loneliness depends on services libraries already offer to their communities. Building community is already a core value of libraries, something library workers are doing now. As with the examples above, we can address loneliness without adding more to our workloads by improving on what we are doing: implementing innovative programming, fostering social connections, and creating inclusive spaces where individuals feel valued, supported, and connected.  Through collaborative efforts, libraries play a vital role in combating loneliness and promoting well-being in their communities.

Discussion Questions

Take a look at your library’s practices and consider some of the following.

  • What are you already doing?
  • What have been your successes? With that in mind, what can you improve or add?
  • How might you meet a new student’s needs while helping them access the resources the library has on offer?

Resources

What to Do When You’ve Been Approached for a Potential Partnership

Editor’s Note: This guest post has been authored by Amber Pierdinock-Weed. Amber is the Teaching and Learning Librarian at the University of Maryland, College Park, where she works closely with the First-Year Writing Program and Learning Living Communities on campus.

In June 2023, I started a position as a Teaching and Learning Librarian at the University of Maryland, a Research I university. Previously, I worked at a small community college, where I was heavily embedded in several departments on-campus. The transition from a community college to a Research I university was intense. My current position includes providing support to non-degree academic programs, such as living-learning communities, the Honors College, and other special populations on campus. When I started my position, I researched the non-degree academic programs on campus, and I began reaching out to select programs to collaborate. I hit many roadblocks: some programs were not interested in collaboration with the library, some programs were content with the interventions the library already had in place, and some did not respond at all. I am a year into my position now, and looking back, I wish I had guidance on the best way to get started creating and rebuilding relationships with non-degree academic programs. This blog post will include what I have learned in my first year in my position and recommendations for new librarians who might be meeting with a program for the first time.

On a Tuesday afternoon, a year into my position at the University of Maryland, I got an email. An undergraduate research program reached out to me, unsolicited, and asked for a meeting to talk about collaboration between their program and the Library. 

As a new librarian who was eager to make an impact, it was easy to almost overcommit to the partnership. Since I work in such a large library, I wanted to be the person who spearheaded an exciting new collaboration for the Library and felt ownership over this potential collaboration. As I read through the course plan the program sent me, I dreamed of embedding librarians into the program, creating benchmarks for librarian intervention in undergraduate research, and library instruction in the program’s for-credit class. All high-level work that would take years to implement well.

It felt high-stakes to talk with the program for the first time. I wanted to present the library as the best collaborator possible, while also maintaining realistic boundaries and expectations. Before the initial meeting, the nervousness kicked in. This program reached out to me, which meant they might already have an idea of what they wanted from the library. From there, the thoughts began to spiral: What if they want something my unit cannot provide? What if their ideas are not feasible? What if they aren’t willing to do a multi-year partnership? What if…?

The excitement and anxiety spiral is easy to fall into. It’s natural! The balance between doing meaningful, yet sustainable, work is thin. If you are looking to set up a partnership with a program on your campus (or maybe you already have a meeting on the calendar), here are some tips to help you prepare for that first meeting:

  • Review program materials: Try to have a decent grounding in the program before the initial meeting by reviewing materials, such as their syllabus, course plan, or website. 
  • Review existing library materials: Review existing internal materials related to the program. In this scenario, the program had a general LibGuide, which I reviewed ahead of the meeting and identified areas for improvement in comparison with the program’s website to identify content that could be updated or that was not in the guide.
  • Start small: Consider small manageable steps. While it may be the end-goal for the Library to have a deep and embedded partnership, consider taking smaller, more actionable steps to get started.
  • Use asynchronous resources: While your immediate reaction might be to schedule tons of instruction sessions, consider creating something asynchronous, like a module in the learning management system. This will allow you to gauge interest without stretching yourself too thin. 
  • Utilize existing materials: Consider any materials your library already has in place. Quality custom materials take time to develop. Are there any videos, tutorials, or modules already existing at your institution that you could use as a basis? Are there other LibGuides that you could use content from or link to?
  • Advocate for yourself: In a haze of wanting to be helpful or immediately starting a collaboration before it loses steam, it is easy to overcommit and overpromise.You have permission to leave the initial meeting with no hard plans, just ideas for further discussion or research.

For my initial meeting with the undergraduate research program, I reviewed the existing LibGuide and I shared some ideas of content I could add to it, mostly pulling from existing materials. We also discussed creating a module for our campus learning management system to provide asynchronous instruction for the program’s credit-bearing class. The potential module would be inspired by a module our library previously created on basic research skills that is used for our first year composition program. Both myself and the representative from the program left the meeting wanting to discuss further with our units and will be coming back together soon to solidify initial library support for the students.

Will this partnership evolve into something deeper? It’s hard to say, but I hope so. It will likely take years to get to where my initial thoughts ran to, and that is okay. Starting small is starting smart. Your students—and your future self—will benefit from a thoughtful, gradual approach.

Engaging in Outreach Efforts & Meaningful Community Building

As a MLIS student at San Jose State University (SJSU), I often read about the importance of promoting library services through outreach efforts. During that time, I ran across the following quote that illustrates this point, and it continues to resonate with me:

Gone are the days when libraries can simply open their doors and expect to be perceived as the number one option for information services. With fierce competition for funding and more people assuming everything offered by a library can be found online, libraries are feeling the pressure to blow their own horn (Hallmark et al., 2007).

Last year, I started as a Lecturer Librarian at CSU Northridge. Since I began in the summer of 2023, I did not immediately have instruction requests or deadlines for collection development. Instead, I directed my attention to outreach opportunities, which continued to be part of my priorities throughout the fall and even now in the spring. I work closely with the Outreach Librarian to deliver outreach programming to keep patrons abreast of upcoming library events, and to promote library collection materials by designing book displays. I have collaborated with faculty, staff, students, and community members to make these events successfully happen. So far, I have remained committed to outreach efforts by participating in the “Ask a Librarian” tabling events, the Resources & Services Fair, the New Student Orientation, CSUN Open House, National Transfer Student Week, and library tours for K-12 students. I am particularly proud of my involvement in creating virtual and in-person book displays for Latinx Heritage Month and Black History Month.

While the outreach opportunities mentioned above have been quite rewarding, I was curious to participate in wider campus efforts centered on outreach and community building. Late last fall, I was selected to be a Library Liaison for the Office of Community Engagement (OCE) at CSU Northridge. This office strives to enhance academic experiences through community-based (service) learning, engaged research and sustained partnerships within the San Fernando Valley, and the greater Los Angeles Area. In my role, I support faculty members as they develop community-engaged projects and/or courses. Faculty members receive support in creating syllabi that outline community-based learning outcomes centered on equity, diversity, and inclusion. I expect that I will also recommend community-engaged readings, and activities for their syllabi.

Since I’m serving in the inaugural cohort, the other Library Liaisons and I have been working on recruitment. During our last departmental meeting, we offered our librarian colleagues a brief overview about the OCE, and we introduced them to grant opportunities designed for faculty members committed to community-engaged courses, projects, research, or creative activities. Additionally, I have been spreading awareness about the OCE to professors and lecturers in the department of Central American & Transborder Studies. After I teach my information literacy sessions, I’ll typically pitch an elevator speech to these faculty members. Usually, faculty members teaching Ethnic Studies already incorporate community-building into the design of their courses, which makes them great candidates.

Overall, I’m hoping my efforts evolve into effective partnerships, so that I may further engage in meaningful practices centered on community building and social justice. I’m definitely in the early stages of developing my own approach towards outreach and community service. I was hoping to hear from experienced academic librarians. Would anyone be willing to share their own strategies?

Dwindling Reference Questions

“If you build it, [will] they will come[?]”

As another season of baseball is just around the corner, I’ve been thinking about ways to get hits and avoid strikes—so decided to break out a classic quotation from Field of Dreams and apply it to academic libraries. In recent years, our library has seen dwindling reference questions. We’re not getting nearly the number of students at our front desk asking questions, nor making as many appointments with librarians, compared to pre-pandemic.

I’m not totally sure what to make of this. I can’t imagine students not needing library services, such as help with literature searching, questions about using databases, or help with citation management software. Not to pump our tires up too much, but these skills typically don’t come intuitively or out of thin air—at least at the level academic librarians support students. Our help is still needed, but without students seeking us out to get that help, we’re missing out on a huge number of opportunities to make students’ lives easier. We want to help.

I suspect that in our post-pandemic era, a ‘generation’ of students don’t have the same familiarity with libraries as they did in previous generations. Did these students miss out on using their high school libraries when they were completing high school largely from home? Did social interactions change post-pandemic? Do students prefer online reference questions and consultations, rather than in-person? And is this affecting the number of questions we’d normally get?

While this is a problem, there’s also opportunity; opportunity to devote more time to seeking in-class instruction—where you seek students out and not vice-versa; opportunity to work on offering enhanced library services; opportunity to plan library events; and more.

I’ve thought about how to address shrinking reference questions. If you assess the number and type of reference questions you’re getting, and it’s different from before—such as fewer or simpler questions—in broad strokes you can approach the issue from a couple perspectives:

  • You can make decisions reactively (e.g. less library staff at the front desk, shorter library or front desk hours), or
  • You can make decisions proactively (e.g. broad, university-wide promotion strategies to inform students what library staff can do for them, reinforce there are no stupid questions and it’s worth getting help from library staff).

Whichever approach you take, you need to think about your goal: are you reacting to fewer reference questions to maintain the status quo or are you proactively trying strategies to ensure students are getting the help they need, and meeting them where you are?

I always think that if we build it, they will come. But maybe we have to tell them what we’ve built. And one thing’s for sure: we must think hard about what to build.

Bad Art Day in the (Academic) Library

Last week, I hosted Bad Art Day, my second public program at Carroll Community College. Bad Art Day (or usually, Bad Art Night) is a popular program at public libraries, and it’s something I’ve wanted to try at an academic library for a while. The concept is pretty self-explanatory: you set out a bunch of art supplies and tell participants to go to town trying to make the ugliest piece of art that they can. 

This program had simple objectives: Creativity is messy. It’s ok to make mistakes. You don’t have to be a perfectionist. I even quoted Jake the Dog from Adventure Time: “Sucking is the first step towards being sort of good at something.”

"Dude, sucking at something is the first step towards being sort of good at something," Jake the Dog quote

I made a call for donated art supplies through our faculty newsletter, and got most of our art supplies this way! The only thing I needed to purchase was a selection of glues (glitter, stick), because all the donated glue was dried out. 

I was anticipating that it would be a hard sell to get students to stop, sit down, and do an active-participation event. I was truly bracing myself to paste on a smile and say “well, sometimes the programs are a bust,” and dutifully clean up my art supplies. Instead, we had 17 participants, including a few faculty members! 

Student making bad art using art supplies
An artist at work

Since starting programming in Fall 2021, our participation has been surprisingly good; there has been a real appetite for screen-free, face-to-face, low-stakes activities on this campus.

Students came between classes, they brought friends, and they chatted with each other while creating. The program was self-explanatory and students were eager to dig in to the art supplies. For the Bad Art Contest, I had the students give their pieces titles, which added to the humor and depth of the entries. 

After Bad Art Day, I created little table-tents with each artist’s name and the title of their pieces, then put them all on display in the library lobby. Students could come see the ugly art, and could even vote on their favorites! Having the art on display stretched the program into the rest of the week; just about everyone who came into the library stopped to look and chuckle at the pieces.

Photo of Bad Art on display across two folding tables
The titles that the students chose were widely regarded as the best part!

Outreach and programming work is possible by yourself, but I don’t recommend it. Whether I’m making a puzzle, choosing a program, or thinking through the logistics of an interactive display, I find myself running my ideas past another person. Interested circulation staff, an eager student worker or volunteer, and even my partner and family have been called on for their two cents on the wording of a discussion question or the layout of a poster. My best ideas have come from these conversational brainstorm sessions at the desk. 

No programming librarian is an island. And if you don’t have colleagues, Pinterest, blogs, library literature, and your patron audience can be your collaborators. I am finding inspiration everywhere.