To Library? Or, Not to Library? Adjusting My Expectations to Meet the Library Users’ Needs

The Library is so crowded!

It gets crazy loud in there.

Can we go to the other room to work on our group project? ( play video games)

Do you have a microwave?

Is the wifi working here? 

Do you have a Chromebook charger?

I really need a Band-Aid!!

Can I get a fork?

As the sole teacher librarian at my school, James Logan High in Union City, CA, these comments and questions became all too familiar to me in the last few years. It seemed that the school libraries I’d grown up with, the ones where silence was golden, students worked quietly and independently, truly were relics of the past.  It was my 10th year, and I kept feeling like I was losing grasp of the space. It was full, lively, and vibrant, but not exactly what I wanted.  I imagined a place where students would study or work with classmates on group projects, collaborate, engage in research, and also read books for pleasure.  Lately, however, it was becoming something else entirely and making me uneasy.

Thankfully, I was part of the School Librarian Community of Practice with Lead by Learning and could share my concerns. We connected,  commiserated together, and I asked them:

How could I get my library back to its original intent: a place of academic inquiry and utility?  It seemed to me that students were not really using the library for those purposes.  What did it mean to be an academic forward library, and how could I create and maintain that?

The librarians encouraged me to consider the students, the principal users of the space, rather than focusing on myself as the teacher librarian who felt like they were flailing. They kept pushing me to go outside of my expectations, to truly observe my students in the library when they came on their own time and to gather data:  What were students doing there and why? Here’s what I discovered:

• BEFORE SCHOOL:  Nearly 300 students would come and go in the morning, with many waiting for me as I arrived around 7:15 am.  Most would sleepily shuffle in, sit quietly and do school work, prepare for their day by printing assignments, borrowing textbooks to review, and wait for friends.  In general, this group of students was very self-sufficient and definitely focused on their academics before heading to their first class.
• LUNCH:  The lunch periods were more lively in terms of students meeting friends to play cards, chess, and use the wifi for video games.  Since our school is so large, lunch is split into two periods, with the first one, 4th period, being much more full and boisterous than the 5th period.  The first lunch would average 200 students, while the 5th period would have around 150.  It would get so loud and boisterous with students cursing loudly while playing video games, eating and leaving trash around, not returning games and borrowed items, and even putting on punching gloves for a library Fight Club!  It was truly getting out of hand.  I couldn’t monitor everything happening everywhere all at once.

I tried limiting the number of students in an effort to crowd control and keep numbers down, but that didn’t feel good or right. I  didn’t want to turn away students when I did, in fact, have space for them, so I needed to really supervise and monitor expectations.

I noticed that when unruly and disruptive students were immediately led out of the library with a warning or with the invitation to return the following day or week, the whole atmosphere would shift, and students could get back to their normal chosen activity.

• AFTER SCHOOL – The fewest students would come during this time, usually to wait for a ride home or if their designated club was meeting there. Sometimes, students would meet tutors as well.

Finally, I talked directly to students and asked: why and when do you typically come to the library, and are your needs being met? I chose several frequent visitors throughout the day.

Here’s what they said:

• “I come to get work done during lunch since I have so many activities after school. I put on my headphones and lock in.”
• “I’m here with my friends, since we have the same lunch period this year. It’s fun to just hang out.”
• “I get dropped off early, so I study or print or just wait for my friends.”
• “It doesn’t seem too loud. Sometimes it’s crowded and there isn’t anywhere to sit, so I just sit on the floor in a corner.”
• “My club had nowhere else to meet after school, and the library is open.”
• “Sometimes you just need somewhere to go.”

I shared all this with the librarians who kept asking me, well, what exactly does an academic library look like? To you? To students? And WHY was this so important? These insightful questions during my time as a Public Learner were invaluable. I hadn’t thought of my inquiry in that way since I had concluded that libraries are supposed to be a certain way. This wasn’t the case at all, and thanks to conversations with the librarians’ group, I could finally see that The Library should be a space for all students (and staff) to utilize in whatever capacity they choose. I did not need to dictate that as they were making productive choices. The librarians encouraged me to focus on all the positive ways the students were using the space.

Here’s what I noticed as the year progressed:

• Clubs and student groups are asked to hold regular meetings in the library.
• Online academy students attended their classes and completed coursework.
• Students who needed a quiet space to meet with advisors/therapists used the smaller rooms.
• Large groups of students who observed Ramadan came to the library during that time. Many whom I’d never seen before. They also began asking to use the smaller study spaces for prayer.
• Students who needed to record interviews or make videos were asked to use the library for footage.
• Photography students utilized the wide open space with different areas of lighting for specific assignments.

Organically, students were using the space for a variety of purposes, and the most important takeaway is that they come to the library! They knew that the library was the place to go for anything they needed.  Whatever the question, the library was the answer.  

While I started the year asking the question, How could I get my library back to its original intent: a place of academic inquiry and utility? I now realize that I didn’t need to do anything since users were getting what they needed in the library, and that is its intent.  I’m the one who didn’t truly believe or understand that. It didn’t matter that the focus wasn’t “academic.”   

The librarians’ group helped me to understand that I’m the one who can adjust to make the space meet users’ needs rather than impose conventional and traditional expectations. Having a group of librarians to work with was paramount to my making this adjustment and reminds me of the importance of belonging to a professional learning community.

Moving forward, I plan to:

• Continue to observe students, for they are the ones using the space more than anyone else.  
• Continue to engage in dialogue with our students.
• Adjust accordingly as I gather feedback from students.
• Talk with staff to hear what they are noticing. 
• Gather data regarding student productivity in the library.
• Monitor my assumptions about what libraries should be like.
• Continue to create a welcoming and safe space for our students.

This year marks Indira Chakrabarti’s 10th year as the Teacher Librarian at James Logan High School in Union City. A public high school educator for over 25 years, she began tutoring high school students while an undergrad at the University of California, Berkeley, where she majored in English Literature and minored in Women’s Studies. Indira embarked on her teaching career at Berkeley High School in 2001 after getting her MA in Education, also from UC Berkeley:  Go Bears. She also holds an MA in Women’s Studies from San Francisco State University because why not? A two-time recipient of the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) fellowship, most recently, Indira worked with The South Asian American Digital Archive to learn more about community archives and the preservation of missing stories of South Asian immigrants. She resides in Oakland with her cats, Chickie & Fernando, and a couple of people.

Interested in working with Lead by Learning to support your educators, librarians, and teacher leaders? Connect with a member of our team to learn more about our partnerships.