No, It's Really Not All That Wonderful to Have So Many Kids In Here

[merkay]

I'm a branch manager at a public library in a very large urban area.  We've had some success in keeping the little darlings' behavior under control by nipping potential problems in the bud before they start.  For example, only one person is allowed to be at a computer.  No one is allowed to pull an extra chair to the terminal, or stand around behind the computer.  Such behavior will get our attention.  Likewise, giggling that we can hear at the reference desk will get a reprimand.  We have an automated computer registration system, so we can send the kids messages when they need a reminder, or end their session when they don't listen. The kids have learned that we are serious about what we expect from them when using the library, and they (mostly) comply. 

I also don't have any problem with kids using the computers to play runescape or mess around on myspace.  We provide the computers without value judgments.  I don't get to decide who is using the computers for a worthy purpose and who is wasting time.  I'm sure most of the adults are looking at crap as well. 

[PoisonIvy]

It's not like they are in here reading, doing homework or using the library as a center of learning.  They are eating, cursing, throwing things, hollering and, in the case of the computers, they are in ch at rooms, playing RuneScape, setting up MySpace accounts which must be pretty bad since they congregate to snicker over them.  They fight over who gets to go on the computer next. 

Jeez, and to think that all these years I'd been under the assumption that the library was for reading!!

Can your IT department block access to Myspace, the chatrooms, etc?  Maybe some will argue that it's draconian, but the computer time is being hogged by kids messing around when someone could be using it for research or homework.  If they need to check their myspace account that desperately, let them do it at home or at an internet cafe.  No kid ever failed an exam or a class project because they couldn't get on myspace.

[IndianInlaw]

I don't know if this is still the policy, but the Cedar Rapids Public Library has privacy screens on their terminals, so anything goes.

I was there when a couple of boys came over to help my son (we're talking 10 or 11 years old) with his terminal.  He was engrossed in what he was doing, so I went over to just to reciprocate (you know, just say hi, or whatever)...And yowza!    They were looking at x rated stuff.  (Look Ma!  No filters!)

It's the library's contention that it's up to the parents to monitor usage.

They'll call the police if anyone under age 8 is left unattended.

[merkay]

Jeez, and to think that all these years I'd been under the assumption that the library was for reading!!

Can your IT department block access to Myspace, the chatrooms, etc?  Maybe some will argue that it's draconian, but the computer time is being hogged by kids messing around when someone could be using it for research or homework.  If they need to check their myspace account that desperately, let them do it at home or at an internet cafe.  No kid ever failed an exam or a class project because they couldn't get on myspace.

Yes, it is a misconception that the library is just for reading.  Sure, we have books, but we are really in the business of providing information.  Information doesn't only come in book form. 

Likewise, I really cringe at the thought that any individual (librarian or not) gets to make value judgments on the worth of what a person is doing with their internet time.  Where would this stop?  Can I also block people from looking at Ebay, Match.com, etc?   What about books?   Can I decide that a certain author's books don't have any educational merit?  I've never liked Danielle Steel.  Can I toss all of her books because I think they are crap and a waste of time? 

At my library, a lot of the adults get very snitty about teens using the computers when they(the adults) want to use them.  They seem to believe that anything they would be doing is automatically more important/valuable merely because they are an adult.   Teens are residents of our community and have just as much right to our services as anybody else. 

We don't use filters at my library because they don't actually work.  We do have privacy screens on the adult computers, so I'm sure some people look at porn.  Unless another patron complains, I don't care.  The children's computers do not have privacy screens, so they will be booted off if they are caught looking at porn. 

[Clara Bow]

I don't have a problem with kids using the computers for pleasure. It's nice to go to the library it doesn't always have to be about academia. But I have a huge problem with them whooping, making noise, creating a disturbance, running amok and monopolizing the computer space and not sharing with others. I also have a problem with children being left unsupervised.
So no, the library doesn't have to be totally about education. It is fine to use it for pleasure (something I've done all my life) but you still have to behave within respectful parameters.

[Yarnspinner]

About judgement calls:  What Merkay said.  I hate the way the computers are used.  I despise the fact that nine times out of ten the child is printing out his or her twentieth picture of Fifty Cent...but as long as he pays for the pictures (that ink is expensive...) I can't tell him or her not to do it. 

I also live in horror of the c*r*a*p we have to purchase for our major clientele.  All the people in this neighborhood carry on about is how they are seen as thugs, gangstas, druggies and h-rhymes-with rows.
But what books do they insist we buy--Zane's various sex addict series, Thugalicious, Thugs R Fun, and every other variation you can imagine which follows the same plot:  young girl is molested by adult male, grows up to be sex addict as well as drug addict as well as gold digger.  Meets her older male lover's attractive younger drug dealing son/nephew/cousin/partner and schemes to do away with older lover.  They do.  And take over his drug business. Happy ending.  I buy this stuff, but I hold my nose while I do.

I've been trying to get back to answer this thread since I posted it and, well, life kept getting in the way. (Also, though she doesn't mind if I read threads at work, my boss doesn't like to see me answering them at the main circulation desk  )

About the security guards:  city doesn't think it is a priority to hire them for us.  We have special officers on loan from the schools.  Who don't show up.  So we complain about them and guess what--deaf ears.
My boss calls HER boss, HER boss calls the Board of Ed and Board of Ed says something on the order of "Not our problem."  Or similar.

On nipping it in the bud:  We have nipped it in the bud so many times our garden shears are ruined.  When the problems began this year, Boss took it to the streets and the community.  She went to the schools, talked with the head of school security (see above), spoke with the local community group...and got lots and lots of promising lip service.  (MAJOR DIGRESSION:  I have to explain about this community association:  everyone likes being on it and talking to each other and sounding important...what they don't seem to like is getting off their collective hinies and doing anything about what they constantly complain about.  This summer one of them came to the branch, saw all the kids, left and returned with sign up sheets for my boss.  "Have them fill out these permission slips and we'll take them and their guardians bowling this Friday."  So, boss takes him at his word, spreads the info to the few parents who show up, has the kids sign up, has parents fill out permission slips, ferries them over a block to the association's office.....and they wait there for two hours before going home.  Seems the guy forgot he had promised this and had gone off on some other project he presumeably didn't finish, either.  There is also a big, burley man on the association who routinely asks us to "Call him" when there's a problem.  So we call him and he says he will be there right away...and shows up five hours later.)  I speak with the teachers, I talk with the daycare providers and I've been known to call parents and complain.  The parents will say "Call thepolice and teach the little so-and-so a lesson."  Great...use the police as nannies.  Excellent.

On offering alternative programming:  Every.  Single. Bloody. Youth. Program. has been shut down due to lack of funding.  There is no place for the kids to hang out...so we are IT. 

Over the years we have asked the kids for their ideas on programming they would be interested in (just like they tell us to do at all the continuing ed seminars).   We get answers that range from rude ("get out of my face") to impractical ("Can you get the Cheetah Girls to come here?") to astronomically impractical ("Just get us fifty computers.")  One parent said she thought it would be wonderful if we got rid of the books and had nothing but wall to wall computers.   So that the kids could print pages of of wiki and turn that in as a report presumeably.

Most programs aimed at the 11-15 element fail because the kids don't want to miss their turn on the computer.  We tried shutting the computers off during the programs, but then the adults complained.


One success (of sorts) My book club is really a film club/game club/food club.  We never actually read books...we kind of bring in related movies, offer healthy snacks and hope for the best.  While we haven't turned them into lovers of the written word, we HAVE gotten them to think outside their little bubbles.  (Favorite programs:  the author who read from her work and brought her old homework in for the kids to read; the amazing discussion and insights generated by three girls who kind of hijacked the club with Bebe Moore Campbell's picture book "Sometimes Mommy Gets Angry"--about living with a bipolar parent; our anime programs which are always popular...and which open the door for me to sneak in some fantasy and horror novels...hey, we haven't done so bad now that I think about it.  What we are really doing, we figure, is giving the kids attention they don't get at home and that's probably a good thing.

about unsupervised children  We have the laws for our state prominently displayed and got cursed out by parents who see us as unpaid sitters ('cause we sit around on our asses all day doing nothin'"  yes, and since I KNOW you don't have a job, describe to me why it is you need a baby sitter?)  I have threatened one mother with calling DCYS because her 16 year old daughter drags her own year old son to the library, then sets him free while she plays on myspace.  Momma told me she was getting custody of the boy--her grandson.  Well, she may have custody of him, but she still allows daughter to take him with her.  When her older son (14 years old) was suspended from the building for a month--but kept coming in anyway, we called and were told "He's asleep in his room".  We told her to check his room since he appeared to be practicing astral projection.  She wouldn't do it. 

This is the kind of mentality we're up against.  It's a place where, if you act with respect toward your elders or like to read or study you are "acting white" and you get beat up for it.  (I'm always amused how these kids are all about respect, but when someone shows actual, real respect, they are "acting" white and need to be beat up.  I'm also disturbed by a mindset that equates things like common courtesy, common sense and behaving in a responsible, intelligent manner as being a "traitor" to your race.  What does that say about YOU and your image of yourself and your race, if you spurn manners and self improvement?  Are you actually trying to prove bigots, racists and like idiots CORRECT in their own illogical rantings?    (Sorry, the Boss says I am like a border collie in that I believe if I use logic and post enough signs and chase after everyone they will fall into line like sheep...I guess I'm just very naive and need to slapped with a clue by four.)

And having re-read this, I realize that I am beginning to ramble.  I didn't intend to and apologize.  It's late, tomorrow's another day (we're closed and I get to do PAPERWORK! YAY!! )  Anyway, if you actually made it all the way through this whine, rest assured, I actually like a lot of my patrons and my job...but this latest tribe of rugrats, their entitlement minded parents, and the do-nothing government system we have in place is just making me a teensy bit crazy...   Thanks for listening....I remain 

Lily  "we need an emoticon for mad, hysterical laughter" Such

Next post I promise not be a drama queen anymore....

[merkay]

Hey Lily, 

I just wanted to express my sympathy for your problems.  They sound much worse than what we experience at my library, although I can't say the same for other branches in the city.  Our director also has formed a working relationship with the police and we are instructed to call the police the minute we tell kids to leave and they don't comply.  The cops will come, and they will escort the little darlings out of the building.  It really does wonders for the behavior of the observers.  It might also help that there have been shootings in 2 of our branches in the past few months.  The cops now know that something bad really can happen at the library. 

We called the police a few weeks ago when a 6' 4" teen wouldn't leave when we asked him to.  The cops arrived, recognized the kid and frisked him.  They found a sharpie marker.  Now we know who was providing the wonderful gang art work in our bathroom. 

All that said, my neighborhood really is very nice, and most of the people who use the library are pleasant people who appreciate what we do.    I hope you can find solutions that work for your library.  If not, come to Chicago! 

[Yarnspinner]

Thanks, Merkay! 

After rereading my last post I'm embarrassed as all get out that I stayed up late to write it.

I would write even more a thank you, but Kitty Such is clawing at my nightgown, telling me to get off that evil box thingie, pet her and go to bed.  (Nothing like having a cat claw your thigh to make you realize you are whining too much!)

Thanks again for the support.  (Only five more years before I can retire! )

Oh, and if you're ever in Connecticut--come on down!

[aloe]

I never heard of Zane books until I read your post.  I did some research on them and they look positively awful and a bad influence on young readers. 

[buckeyefan]

When I was in grad school there was a man from the community who would go into the university's library as soon as it opened in the morning and look at pornography.

A few of us complained, but the librarians told us that he had a legal right to use the computers since this was a public university.

We came up with our own plan to get rid of him. We would congregate around the computers near him and make so much noise that he'd leave. He eventually stopped using the library.

[Yarnspinner]

I never heard of Zane books until I read your post.  I did some research on them and they look positively awful and a bad influence on young readers. 

Aloe,

TECHNICALLY, Zane's books are being read by Mom and Dad.  (Digression:  most mommies owe so much money on their library cards their borrowing privileges have been suspended...so they take the books out on their infants' cards.  I've been questioning this at circulation committee meetings, as a two year old shouldn't have that trash on the card...but apparently, this takes not just an act of God, but an act of our library board...who feel that happy, thieving patrons are still good patrons.)

Zane (if you've ever seen her picture) looks like a cute little housewife (think Nell Carter in an apron).  She's the "Bertrice Small" of Urban Lit (we get Bertrice's books in, too, for people who like their over-the-top romps in Elizabethan garb).  She "sort of" was the first urban lit author to go mainstream.  Because her books circulate so well we get more of same which makes our stats look great...but doesn't say much for the primary mission of enlightening, illuminating  and providing information for the information havenots.  It's sad when James Baldwin and Toni Morrison or Alice Walker sit on the shelf while this stuff circulates and is trumped up as "authentic" experience.

We try to keep the trash out of the teens' hands, but it doesn't always work, especially when Mom loves the stuff, too.

When I was in grad school there was a man from the community who would go into the university's library as soon as it opened in the morning and look at pornography.

A few of us complained, but the librarians told us that he had a legal right to use the computers since this was a public university.

We came up with our own plan to get rid of him. We would congregate around the computers near him and make so much noise that he'd leave. He eventually stopped using the library.

I LOVE this!  Of course, we're all about trying to keep the noise down.  You remind me of something that happened when the internet first went public for libraries.  There was a guy who came in on a daily basis to look for a subscription to a magazine called "Women Who Love Bondage."  After the third or fourth time thru, I refused to help him anymore since I was sure he was getting his jollies having me help him look.  But he was dead serious on all of this and spent hours with my male co-workers trying to find the subscription on line.  They'd thought it was a big laugh when it was me and thought I was too sensitive.  But as one of them reached an hours worth of helping, he threw a hissy fit.  Turn about is fair play, after all.  I smiled a lot.

The same creepy guy was also trying to apply for a state job---at the Women's Correctional Center here.  Eeeeeeeeeeewwwwwwwwwwwwww!!!!!  I was so squicked out by what I knew about him it was all I could do to keep from clobbering him.

ETA because I forgot I was trying to explain why we have trash that teens and younger can get hold of...

[Slartibartfast]

At my library, children under 14 can't check out rated-R movies - but they're allowed to check out any books they want.  We do have a few (the Illustrated Guide to Black Sex, for instance, which cracks me up because I don't see what's so black about it) that I hope they don't find, but since they don't know where to look, so far it's been all good :-)

[merkay]

At my library, children under 14 can't check out rated-R movies - but they're allowed to check out any books they want.  We do have a few (the Illustrated Guide to Black Sex, for instance, which cracks me up because I don't see what's so black about it) that I hope they don't find, but since they don't know where to look, so far it's been all good :-)

I actually vehemently disagree with policies like this.  There is a lot of literature out there that somebody is going to object to.   I also have a feeling that the books about gay issues would end up on such "banned" lists.  So, equal access to information for all patrons, as far as I'm concerned.  If a parent doesn't want their child to see or read something, they can come to the dingdangity library with them.   I also doubt that most parents would agree with what I think their children shoul be reading, anyway.

[freakyfemme]

"Hey, Tziphaknee, that's a pretty nice MySpace profile you've got there.  What are those?  Soccer pictures?  You like playing soccer, don't you?  Well, here's a book on Mia Hamm, would you like to borrow that for a few weeks?"

Just being idealistic for a second here......but, would that work?

[Slartibartfast]

At my library, children under 14 can't check out rated-R movies - but they're allowed to check out any books they want.  We do have a few (the Illustrated Guide to Black Sex, for instance, which cracks me up because I don't see what's so black about it) that I hope they don't find, but since they don't know where to look, so far it's been all good :-)

I actually vehemently disagree with policies like this.  There is a lot of literature out there that somebody is going to object to.   I also have a feeling that the books about g*a*y issues would end up on such "banned" lists.  So, equal access to information for all patrons, as far as I'm concerned.  If a parent doesn't want their child to see or read something, they can come to the dingdangity library with them.   I also doubt that most parents would agree with what I think their children shoul be reading, anyway.

I think it's a legal thing - providing rated R material to minors would be equivalent to letting them into an R-rated movie, which you're supposed to be at least 16 to see when unaccompanied by an adult (at least in the US).  More realistically, for parents who work and can't spend all their free time babysitting their pre-teens, it keeps the kids from checking out movies against their parents' permission.  Books aren't rated, so there's no real way to separate them out like that (and I don't buy a lot of books that I'd object to my kids seeing, anyway - at least not at my branch).