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findhelp.org by findhelp - Search and Connect to Social Care

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Search and connect to support. Find financial assistance, food pantries, medical care, and other free or reduced-cost help in your area, anywhere in the US.

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Caseyville Public Library District's Social Emotional Support page on library website.

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Caseyville Public Library District's Social Emotional Support page on library website.

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Social Work Approaches to Library Services

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Learn how a range of social work approaches can be applied to help improve library services for your community.

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As awareness increases about the need to address personal challenges both inside and out of the library, staff and practitioners—from leaders to frontline workers—are sharing their experiences, observations, and views around trauma-informed librarianship.

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Library Patrons' Psychosocial Needs: Perceptions of Need and Reasons for Accessing Social Work Services

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Abstract. Public libraries in the United States have begun to partner with social work to address the psychosocial needs observed in patrons that are beyond the

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Libraries and Social Workers — Perfect Partners - Social Work Today Magazine

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National newsmagazine committed to enhancing the entire social work profession by exploring its difficult issues, new challenges, and current successes.

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by Rhiannon B. Eades/reades@athenslibrary.org (This article originally appeared in the Sept/Oct 2019 issue of Public Libraries.)

While library social workers aren't new, the Athens-Clarke County (GA) Library (ACCL) has taken this concept further by working toward offering trauma-informed care at the library, thanks to a partnership with the University of Georgia School of Social Work (UGA) funded by a Community Catalyst grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) National Leadership Grant Program.

The library, which serves as the headquarters of the Athens Regional Library System (ARLS), was one of 12 US institutions to receive a Community Catalyst grant from IMLS in 2018, from an applicant pool of 51. The $150,000 grant funds a two-year partnership between the library and UGA. The partnership is called Trauma Informed Library Transformation (TILT).

"Our library staff members work hard every day to provide the best service to everyone who walk through our doors and we are always looking for new ways to engage more effectively with our patrons," said ARLS Executive Director Valerie Bell. "We already follow many of the principles associated with trauma-informed care in our libraries, and we are excited that TILT will give us the opportunity to learn more, hone our skills, an deepen our connection to our community."[1]

TILT, which officially started in October 2018, is designed to create a trauma-informed environment at the library. As part of the partnership, an internship program has been established to embed social work graduate students at the library. These interns will perform community assessments, evaluate initiatives, link patrons to area resources, an ensure library services are provided using a trauma-informed lens. The program also establishes an after school peer-mentoring program for teen girls from local high schools.

From left to right: Akilah Blount (B.E.E. program specialist); Liv Ricketts (social work intern); Valerie Bell (ARLS executive director); Simone Moonsammy (social work intern); Lydia Hall (social work intern). Photo by Rhiannon B. Eades, used with permission.

WHAT DOES IT MEAN TO BE TRAUMA-INFORMED?

According to the US Department of Health and Human Services Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), individual trauma results from an event, a series of events, or a set of circumstances experienced by an individual as physically or emotionally harmful or life-threatening and that has lasting adverse effects on the individual's functioning mental, physical, social, emotional, or spiritual well-being.[2]

Any type of organization can provide services following a trauma-informed framework by incorporating six principles of trauma-informed care. According to SAMHSA those principles include:

1. safety;

2. trustworthiness;

3. peer support;

4. collaboration and mutuality;

5. empowerment, voice and choice; and

6. cultural, historical, and gender issues [3]

In a trauma-informed setting, staff understand and take into account the impact of trauma, toxic stress, and adverse childhood experiences; recognize the signs and symptoms of trauma; response by fully integrating this knowledge into policies, procedures, and practices; and resist causing further problems.[4]

"In an ideal world, everyone who interacts with people and families understands trauma and is sensitive to it," said Jennifer Elkins, an associate professor at UGA School of Social Work and a member of the TILT team.[5] In 2017, Elkins helped organize Awareness to Action: Community Summit on Trauma and Toxic Stress in Athens. This event brought together roughly 200 local professionals from education, law enforcement, criminal justice, child welfare, mental health, other services providers, and community members who expressed concern and interest in establishing a trauma-informed approach to addressing many issues faced in the Athens community.

In the grant proposal, Donna Crumby, assistant director for organizational development at ARL, pointed to the 2017 summit as evidence that there is genuine interest by stakeholders and gatekeepers in Athens to work together to ensure that vulnerable community members don't fall through the crack. "We want to do what we can to connect with vulnerable people in our community. The library is seen by many as a safe place and our goal is to be able to do more to affect positive change in the lives of our many community members who are in need," Brumby wrote in her application.[6]

Elkins assisted library staff in writing the TILT grant proposal and offered examples of what a trauma-informed service model could look like at the library. A library using such a model is culturally inclusive and its staff members are trained to recognize signs of and triggers for trauma and work with patrons accordingly. Library staff offering service via a trauma-informed lens practice holistic, integrated librarianship; have an awareness of resources and support and facilitate access to those resources; and actively work to create a safe, calm, welcoming facility with programming for diverse populations. Library policies and procedures are reviewed with an eye toward avoiding retraumatizing patrons.

WHY SHOULD LIBRARY SERVICE BE TRAUMA-INFORMED?

ARLS serves residents in five northeast Georgia Counties and was named the 2017 George Public Library of the Year. The library system adopted "Engaging Communities...Exceeding Expectations" as its vision statement in 2016 and staff continue striving to increase outreach at community events, offer new services to meet patrons' evolving needs, and forge new partnerships with local organizations. Library staff worked together in 2017 to identify five keywords: inclusive, community, respectful, excellence, and welcoming. These keywords guide the library system's policies, procedures, and philosophy.

"Becoming a trauma-informed library is a natural progression of the library's commitment to the people it serves," Bell said. "Every day, people who are experiencing trauma come into our libraries. Many are young people trying to establish their future in our communities. Empowering library staff to recognize these efforts and to be able to connect patrons with the resources they need is one way for the public library to be more proactive in service to its communities."[7]

Home to the University of Georgia, Athens is a small city in Northeast Georgia with a population of 127,000.[8] The city's population is young with a median age of 26.5 [9] While it is the smallest county in Georgia, geographically speaking, Athens-Clarke County has the fourth highest poverty rate in the state with 36.7% of its residents living in poverty, including 39% of the county's children under the age of 18.[10]

Homelessness is an issue in Athens-Clarke County. According to the 2018 Point in Time (PIT) Count required by the US Department of Housing and Urban Development, there were 212 people experiencing homelessness in January 2018, not counting those who couch surf or stay with friends and family.[11] From the count, 57% are men and 43% are women. Adults make up 69% of Athens residents experiencing homelessness, while 26% are children, and 5% are young adults, ages 18-24. Only 7% identified as military veterans.[12]

"We see a wide range of patrons at the library, including people who have experienced trauma such as homelessness, PTSD, mental and physical challenges, violence, and other issues," said Trudi Green, assistant director for public services at ACCL. "Sometimes trauma can make accessing resources and services challenging, even if it seems like those resources are readily available."[13] As another example of need, Bell points out that the library sits across the street from a large hospital. Patients are sometimes referred to the library for help upon discharge from the hospital. The public library is a natural fit for a trauma-informed care initiative, as it is considered a safe and welcoming space for all, regardless of a person's socioeconomic status or life experiences.

"Often, people experiencing challenges - homelessness, unemployment, etc. -come to the library to learn about resources. Many of these folks have histories of trauma, so having staff who understand trauma and can be warm and supportive will help these vulnerable folks immensely," UGA School of Social Work Dean Anna Scheyett explained. "Basically, we should assume that most people have experienced some trauma, and so libraries need to be trauma-informed. The shift in thinking is from "what's wrong with you" to "what happened to you."[14]

ESTABLISHING A SOCIAL WORK INTERNSHIP PROGRAM

Library staff members have worked with UGA to create an internship program for social work graduate students. Three interns (one second-year student and two first-year students) began working at the library in October, 2018. Together, the three interns are at the library 36 hours per week. The interns engage in six school credits over the course of the two semesters following a specific curriculum that integrates their activities at the library with classroom learning. "The purpose is to gain experience and master social work competencies with specific practice context," explained Caroline Sharkey, the students' clinical supervisor. [15] The interns are tasked with gathering information as part of a community needs assessment, working with the public directly by connecting patrons with community resources, and evaluating the program's effectiveness.

For the first several months of the program, library staff and partners laid the groundwork for TILT. The interns pored over scholarly articles, networked with library social workers around the country, and worked on a community resource guide that can be used by staff and patrons alike. "Oftentimes, the people who need help have already been referred to providers, but the personal connection is key," explained Elkins. "This guide will enable staff and the interns to better connect people with the resources they need. By networking with local providers, the interns are compiling information including eligibility requirements, names of gatekeepers, and other helpful information which will ensure people who need help are better able to access it. It's one thing to have a list of organizations to hand to patrons who need help, but telling a patron about how to qualify, how to apply, and who to talk to makes it more likely that person will be able to successfully connect with the needed resources."[16]

"We've been doing a lot of background work, which looks like community resource development and consolidation, brainstorming community events/trainings, and reading research ... about other libraries that have successfully implemented social workers into [their libraries]," explained Lydia Hall, an MSW candidate and one of the library's three interns. "We've also been undergoing trauma-informed and crisis intervention trainings by our clinical supervisors which we then train library staff in. We've been getting to know the staff and observing interactions between them and patrons to get a feel for the diverse culture of the library. We are setting up meetings with community partners to inform them of the grant to collaborate on referrals." [17]

In Spring, 2019, the interns began a schedule of regular office hours at the library, where they are available to meet with patrons and serve as a resource for library staff members.

"While we work with the patrons, we want to remind staff that we are here for them too," said Liv Ricketts, an MSW candidate at UGA and TILT intern. "We want to make sure that they feel supported, encouraged, and safe here, so that they can do their jobs well. We have some trainings coming up to help staff get a better idea of what trauma-informed care actually means and how they can apply it here." [18]

SHARING THE IDEA OF TRAUMA-INFORMED CARE WITH LIBRARY STAFF MEMBERS

All library staff will undergo regular, required training as part of TILT, as needs are identified. One key component of the program's early work was a December 2018 survey for library staff members which included questions designed to identify staff needs in serving patrons who may be experiencing trauma or the effects of trauma. The survey asked staff to gauge their confidence in serving patrons experiencing a range of issues as well as to reflect upon challenges and to identify current organizational supports. The survey's results will be factored into the trainings developed and implemented by the TILT team to ensure all staff have the tools and support they need to best serve patrons through a trauma-informed lens. "We are looking forward to learning what a trauma-informed environment will look like at our library. Once we are able to analyze our survey results, we'll have a clearer picture of what kind of training is needed." explained Bell.

The TILT team's training program for staff has been designed to be flexible and adaptable to accommodate needs as they are identified through surveys and environmental observation. The library's leadership team received an overview of trauma-informed services in December 2018, and all staff received thorough training in early 2019. Optional trainings will also be offered to staff members based on assessment of issues faced by members of the community. For example, library staff had the opportunity to attend QPR (Question, Persuade, and Refer) training on suicide prevention in November 2018 as the first optional training offered through the program.

The B.E.E. Club: Empowering Teen Girls through Education

In addition to staff training and the social work internship program, TILT also includes the establishment of a new after-school peer-mentoring program for teen girls in Athens-Clarke County. In speaking to school guidance counselors during the information-gathering phase of the grant-writing process, library staff learned that many young girls in Athens-Clarke County are struggling to cope with trauma, including fragmented families and difficult home situations.

The B.E.E. Club, which stands for Becoming Empowered through Education, is designed to inspire personal development for female-identified students in grades 9-12 by teaching life skills and strategies for academic and social success, while recognizing and allowing for experiences of trauma. The objective is for B.E.E. Club members to become leaders in their schools and communities, serving as peer mentors for younger girls and successfully navigating their way to adulthood.

Club members will learn valuable leadership skills that will serve them through adulthood, including written and oral communication, relationship building, conflict resolution, and teamwork. During the school year, the teens will participate in weekly meetings and activities while receiving training in areas such as strategic planning, public speaking, visual design, and media relations.

"We want to empower teens so they can discover their voices and become advocates for themselves and for issues they care about," explained Akilah Blount, B.E.E. Club programming specialist.[20] Blount, a UGA Women's Studies program graduate, designed the B.E.E. Club and will serve as the club's programming specialist during the TILT partnership. The club includes a weeklong leadership camp for rising seniors, who will then have ownership in their respective schools' B.E.E. Club chapters. The clubs, facilitated at the school level by a volunteer teacher sponsor and the programming specialist, will meet after school on a daily basis.

A TRAUMA-INFORMED APPROACH BENEFITS EVERYONE

All ACCL patrons, regardless of their social status or circumstances, will have even better access to all of the resources they need in an environment that is safe and welcoming when they visit the library once TILT is fully implemented.

"Social work services should be deeply embedded in the community, in places where people trust and feel welcomed. The library is one such place, if not the place," said Scheyett. "Having library staff who are knowledgeable about the effects of trauma can help make the library as trusted, welcoming, and supportive as possible. Plus, having social work students who can help connect people with service they need throughout the community, will be a novel and powerful combination."[21]

Through the work of TILT, library staff will have the training, tools, and skills they need to recognize the signs and symptoms of trauma and serve all patrons confidently and sensitively. Library staff and UGA partners plan to create a sustainable program that will outlast TILT's two-year period. TILT's evaluation tools will provide useful data and service models that will serve as examples to other libraries interested in establishing similar programs.

"By establishing trauma-informed services, we hope to create a space where all members of the community feel respected and empowered to connect," said Bell. "This is an innovative and important project and we are so pleased to have this opportunity. We are truly thankful for the support of the Institute of Museum and Library Services.

References

1. Valerie Bell, personal interview with the author, December 2018.
2. " Trauma," U.S.Department of Health and Human Services' Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), accessed July 25, 2019.
3. Ibid.
4. Ibid.
5. Jennifer Elkins, email interview with the author, December 2018.
6. Donna Brumby, "Toward a Trauma-Informed Approach to Library Service," grant application, May 14, 2018.
7. Valerie Bell, email interview with the author.
8. " Quick Facts: Clarke County Georgia," US Census Bureau, 2018.
9. Ibid.
10. Ibid.
11. Action Agenda: A Community and Economic Development Strategic Plan for Athens-Clarke County, Georgia (2017): 11.
12. 2018 Athens-Clarke County Homeless Point-in-Time Count, Athens-Clarke County Housing and Community Development Department.
13. Trudi Green, email interview with the author, December 2018.
14. Anna Scheyett, email interview with the author, August 2018.
15. Caroline Sharkey, "A Social Worker Walks Into a Library: Organizational Supports and the Trauma-Informed Library Transformation," presentation, December 18, 2018.
16. Jennifer Elkins, personal interview with the author, December 2018.
17. Lydia Hall, personal interview with the author, December 2018.
18. Liv Ricketts, personal interview with the author, December 2018.
19. Bell, ibid.
20. Akilah Blount, email interview with the author, December 2018.
21. Scheyett, ibid.
22. Bell, ibid.

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by Rhiannon B. Eades/reades@athenslibrary.org (This article originally appeared in the Sept/Oct 2019 issue of Public Libraries.) While library social workers aren't new, the Athens-Clarke County (GA) Library (ACCL) has taken this concept further by working toward offering trauma-informed care at the library, thanks to a partnership with the University of Georgia School of Social Work (UGA) funded by a Community Catalyst grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) National Leadership Grant Program.

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Art by @gabriellarosie
I recently had the opportunity to teach several webinars for the Southeast Florida Library Information Network. One of the topics they asked me to speak about was trauma-informed librarianship, something I have been teaching on, incorporating into my practices and pedagogy, and continuing to learn about. Today, I'd like to share a primer on trauma-informed librarianship to help us move towards healing.

Trauma, as defined by the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, "results from an event, series of events, or set of circumstances experienced by an individual as physically or emotionally harmful or life-threatening with lasting adverse effects on the individual's functioning and mental, physical, social, emotional, or spiritual well-being."

There are many types of traumatic events and circumstances that lead to trauma. Trauma can happen to anyone. You can't tell by looking at someone if they're a trauma survivor or not. Unless someone discloses to you that they are a survivor, there isn't anyway to tell. This is one of the reasons why trauma-informed care is so important when it comes to librarianship. You are interacting with survivors already, whether you know it or not, and knowing how to make positive and supportive changes in your library is part of providing equitable service.

Trauma's impact is broad, deep, and life-shaping. It affects how people approach services.

Trauma does not occur in a vacuum. Trauma occurs in the context of community. How a community responds to trauma sets the foundation for the impact of the traumatic event, experience, and effect. Communities that provide a context of empathy, self-determination, and compassion may facilitate the recovery and healing process for the survivor. However, communities that avoid, overlook, or misunderstand trauma can often be retraumatizing and interfere with the healing process. Survivors can actually be retraumatized by the people whose intent is to be helpful. This is one of the reasons why being trauma-informed as librarians and library workers is so important.

Trauma also can impact communities as a whole. Similarly how individual survivors experience trauma, a community may be subjected to a community threatening event, have a shared experience of the event, and an adverse, prolonged, effect. This could be a result of a natural disaster, such as Hurricane Katrina, or that of structural violence, such as colonization, white supremacy, slavery, or mass incareceration. The resulting trauma is often transmitted from one generation to the next in a pattern referred to as historical, community, or intergenerational trauma.

Not only are trauma-informed services critical for individual survivors and communities who have experienced trauma but they also benefit those without trauma histories. A trauma-informed approach to our work realizes every choice we make, every interaction we have, every policy we create... they all have the potential to be retraumatizing or healing for our patrons and each other. Let's be intentional about creating cultural shifts in our work and our libraries to choose healing.

Part of trauma-informed librarianship is unlearning ableism to shift our thinking. We need to move from thinking "What's wrong with you?" when we encounter a "difficult" patron or even, a difficult coworker, to asking "What do you need?"

Symptoms and difficult behaviors are strategies developed to cope with trauma. While these behaviors and symptoms may no longer be adaptive, the important thing to remember is at one point, they were. They may have even been the difference between life and death. We can't know everyone's situation nor should we attempt to diagnose but we can work to grow our own capacity for empathy and compassion when we're confronted with symptoms or behaviors that are difficult for us or we don't understand.

We don't need to know why someone is reacting the way they're reacting but we do need to understand that every person deserves empathy, compassion, and healing, which is why staying calm, warm, and informative is so important - and can even potentially keep difficult interactions from escalating.

Trauma-informed care is a term that originated from the healthcare field but is now being applied to a wide range of other professions - like librarianship! Trauma-informed care has four goals, known as the four R's.

The first is that trauma-informed care realizes the widespread impact of trauma and understands potential paths for recovery. Realization means that all people, at all levels of the library, have a basic realization about trauma and understand how trauma can affect patrons, families, groups, organizations, and communities. This means that we understand people's experience and behavior in the context of coping strategies designed to survive adversity and overwhelming circumstances.

Secondly, trauma-informed care recognizes the signs and symptoms of trauma in patrons, families, staff, and others involved with the library. Recognizing means that people in the library are able to recognize the signs of trauma, which may be gender, age, or setting-specific and may be manifested by individuals seeking or providing services in these settings, for example, both patrons and library workers and librarians.

Next, trauma-informed care responds by fully integrating knowledge about trauma into policies, procedures, and practices. This means that the library responds by applying the principles of a trauma-informed approach to all areas of functioning. The library integrates an understanding that the experience of traumatic events impacts all people involved, whether directly or indirectly. It also means that staff in every part of the library have changed their language, behaviors and policies to take into consideration the experiences of trauma among patrons and staff.

Finally, trauma-informed care resists re-traumatization, meaning that the library seeks to resist retraumatization of patrons, as well as staff. Libraries often unintentionally create stressful or toxic environments that interfere with the recovery of patrons, the well-being of staff and the fulfillment of our mission. So, staff are taught to recognize how organizational practices may trigger painful memories and retraumatize patorons with trauma histories.

A trauma-informed framework relies on six key principles, which are:

1. Safety

2. Trustworthiness and Transparency

3. Peer Support

4. Collaboration and Mutuality

5. Empowerment, Voice and Choice; and

6. Cultural, Historical, and Gender Issues

The first principle of trauma-informed care is safety. Safety means that our diverse staff and the many people we serve feel both physically and psychologically safe. We understand safety as defined by those we serve, which involves actively listening to people with less power and privilege than us and then taking action to repair the harm when it happens.

In practice, safety might look like:

Clearly marked entrance and exit signs to ensure that the physical environment is safe in case of an emergency

Rethinking our relationship with the police due to the ways in which police brutalize, harm, and kill people of color, especially people of color who are disabled and/or queer and transgender. We need to think about what alternatives to police we can utilize because cops are never the solution.

Offering staff training on topics like implicit bias, trauma stewardship, mental health first aid, and so on, to better equip library workers and librarians with the skills we need to be culturally competent in order to provide unbiased and equitable services.

The second principle of trauma-informed care is trustworthiness and transparency. This means that all library operations and decisions are conducted with transparency with the goal of both building and maintaining trust with patrons and among staff, as well as others involved with our libraries. I want to emphasize that transparency is about what others want to know, not what we think they want to or should know.

In practice, trustworthiness and transparency might look like:

Patrons know and trust that staff members will treat personal information as confidential.

Library rules and policies are clearly communicated and equitably enforced.

Transparent decision-making processes at all levels of the library.

The third principle of trauma-informed care is peer support. Peer support, along with mutual self-help, are crucial vehicles for establishing safety and hope, building trust, enhancing collaboration, and utilizing survivor's stories and lived experiences to promote recovery and healing. "Peers" refers to individuals with lived experiences of trauma because not everyone uses, identifies with, or prefers the term "survivor." When talking with someone who has lived experiences of trauma, reflect the language they use to talk about and describe themselves.

Peer support in practice could look like:

Prioritizing #ownvoices titles in displays and on booklists.

Clearly communicating guidelines for sharing concerns and making them easily accessible.

Creating opportunities for community members to gather at our libraries around shared experiences to meet new people, build relationships, and access support.

The fourth principle of trauma-informed care is collaboration and mutuality. This principle places importance on partnering and the leveling of power differences between staff and patrons and among organizational staff, demonstrating that healing happens in relationships and in the meaningful sharing of power and decision-making. The library recognizes that everyone has a role to play in a trauma-informed approach as " one does not have to be a therapist to be therapeutic."

In practice, collaboration and mutuality could look like:

Giving staff opportunities to collaborate within and among different teams, departments, and work groups.

Creating opportunities for both staff and patrons to contribute feedback on decisions that affect them.

Partnering with local community organizations to create community-relevant and culturally-responsive spaces, programs, and services.

The fifth principle of trauma-informed care is empowerment, voice, and choice. This means that throughout the library and among the patrons served, individuals' strengths and experiences are recognized and built upon. The library fosters a belief in the primacy of the people served and in the ability of individuals, organizations, and communities to heal and promote recovery from trauma.

In practice, empowerment, voice, and choice might look like:

Providing reader's advisory and reference interactions that offer a variety of choices.

Programming decisions that are led by what our communities want and need, not what we think they want and need.

Creating clear signage, displays, and discovery tools to help patrons find what they need and want, especially on sensitive topics.

Cultural, historical, and gender issues are the sixth and final principle of trauma-informed care. This principle means that the library actively moves past cultural stereotypes and biases, offers access to gender-responsive services, and leverages the healing value of cultural connections. The library recognizes and addresses historical trauma and incorporates policies, protocols, and processes that are responsive to the racial, ethnic, and cultural needs of their patrons.

In practice, cultural, historical, and gender issues might look like:

Having gender-inclusive bathrooms available with clear signage directing patrons to them and removing access barriers such as keys.

Using Universal Design principles informed by an intersectional lens. Without intersectionality, universal design is meaningless.

Consulting - and compensating - and/or partnering with culturally-specific organizations to serve different cultural groups in the community

Creating a trauma-informed library is a big goal but there are small things we can do everyday, that we can do today, to chip away at structural inequities, violences, and barriers created by trauma. As adrienne maree brown eloquently states, "The small is all."
What's one thing you will do today to move towards a more trauma-informed practice in your library? Resources Reading

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Moving Towards Healing: A Trauma-Informed Librarianship Primer

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Art by @gabriellarosie I recently had the opportunity to teach several webinars for the Southeast Florida Library Information Network. One of the topics they asked me to speak about was trauma-informed librarianship, something I have been teaching on, incorporating into my practices and pedagogy,

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All guides: Trauma-Informed Libraries: The Trauma-Informed Library

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All guides: Trauma-Informed Libraries: The Trauma-Informed Library

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An Introduction to Public Library Social Work

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An Introduction to Public Library Social Work

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"Cultivating Protective Libraries: An Introduction to Public Library Social Work" is presented by Patrick Lloyd, LMSW, Community Resilience Consultant for the Texas State Library and Archives Commission.
Organized by: The Network of the National Library of Medicine is funded by the National Library of Medicine, National Institutes of Health, Department of Health and Human Services. Learn more at https://nnlm.gov

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Network of the National Library of Medicine [NNLM]

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HEALTH BYTES w/ Region 3 - Cultivating Protective Libraries (July 13, 2022)

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T he Ontario Library Association Super Conference is the largest annual gathering of bookish public servants in the country. The days-long event at the sprawling Metro Toronto Convention Centre is both an industry trade show and the de facto meeting spot for all of Canada's librarians-a place to catch up on the latest in cataloguing, hobnob with distant colleagues, and take stock of the state of the library.

On a bitterly cold Friday this February, the final day of the 2023 event, vendors in the exposition hall upstairs were busy hawking everything from book-moving services to exotic animal visits. Former Toronto mayor David Miller sat alone at the University of Toronto Press booth, surrounded by copies of his latest hardcover, while a buzzy line formed down the aisle for signed copies of a picture book about a giant beet. Downstairs, in the corporately neutral confines of meeting room 202D, a full house had gathered to talk about one of the burning issues at the heart of the modern public library.

Rahma Hashi, a social worker with a bright smile and a beige head scarf, began the session. Over the past decade or so, in response to the waves of vulnerable people arriving at their doors, many North American libraries have begun hiring in-house social workers. Hashi was one of Toronto Public Library's first. Part of her role, she explained, was to make partnerships with shelters, with the idea that the library should always be a welcoming place for everyone but the real work of providing service to people who are homeless should be handled by the professionals.

The reality is somewhat different. In Toronto, over the past few months, Hashi explained, there were about 11,000 people experiencing homelessness, according to the city's count. That's around 11,000 people who may be coming in to a library space to warm up during the day, she said. Some branches are open later than other social services, and most shelters in Toronto had been full anyway, so library workers were often asked to do the impossible-find shelter for someone in a system that often had no room. "When people come to us at the eleventh hour, when we're closing, and they say, 'Can you help me find a bed for tonight?' we call Central Intake, and they're at 100 percent capacity."

Vicky Varga, a twenty-four-year veteran of Edmonton Public Library, described how the city had moved toward fully integrating social work into the activities of its main library branch. "People really do seek this out, because it's the last truly public space, as I'm sure everybody in this room knows," she said.

It's an evocative phrase-"the last public space." It's one I heard over and over while reporting this story, often invoked as a kind of badge of honour. For the library CEOs who need to justify their budgets to unsympathetic city councils, the phrase emphasizes the importance of their institutions: like the "last old-growth rainforests" or "the last Galápagos tortoises," "the last public space" sounds like something we should probably spend some money to preserve.

As a description of the role of the library, the phrase is also a remarkable illustration of how far the institution has come. Libraries were once places to access books. They are now places to access everything? The last place to access anything? As the social safety net has frayed, libraries have found themselves filling in the gaps. The conversation in room 202D that afternoon was the sound of library workers struggling with the reality that, despite their best efforts, an institution organized around lending out hardcovers might not be up for the job.

Every library branch in every city has its own specific issues, but in conversations with workers across the country, the broad strokes of the crisis are the same. Librarians say they're seeing more people with more complex needs than ever before. In Toronto, the number of recorded "incidents," a term which includes violent, disruptive, or threatening events, spiked from 7.16 per 100,000 visits in 2012 to 35.74 in 2021. In Edmonton, where librarians are offered training to administer naloxone, 2022 saw ninety-nine opioid poisonings across the system. On Vancouver Island, some workers went on strike for nearly two months over workplace concerns and a lack of wage growth. In a letter to library trustees, they argued that "management has refused to agree to many important proposals-including solutions to workplace violence and mental health impacts." Library workers across the country report being attacked, spat on, threatened, sexually assaulted. They describe the emotional toll that results from not having the necessary resources to help the people who come to them, day after day. They talk about picking up the phone to call for help and realizing that nobody's coming.

When the floor opened for questions that afternoon in Toronto, hands shot up. A grey-haired man wanted to know how many social workers Edmonton had hired. "Winnipeg just added its third, and there just aren't enough hours in the day for the demand," he said quietly. "How are you going to increase support for staff?" asked a woman near the front. A man mentioned that, because some of Toronto's branches that have more difficult patrons are unpopular among staff, the least experienced, least senior employees often end up working there.

"What is the next step?" asked a woman from Vancouver Public Library. It was the question that seemed to be on everyone's mind. People, she said bluntly, were dying. "At what point do library workers, managers, directors speak directly to governments?"

The speakers murmured vague answers about each person doing their best to make change within their own realm, but the truth was there were no good answers. The session ended, and the attendees shuffled out into the vast carpeted expanse of the convention centre. But in the months since, that conversation has continued-in discussions between library CEOs, in meetings between union leaders, and in chats between harried workers on their breaks: What is the next step? Where does the library go from here? Because it's clear that being "the last public space" isn't a privilege. It's a sign that something has gone terribly wrong.

L ibrarians are a remarkably collegial group, quick to praise one another. Ask them which libraries are doing interesting things, and they'll talk about Halifax's gorgeous Central Library and Edmonton's innovative social programs, Vancouver's community work on the Downtown Eastside and the herculean feat of running Toronto's 100 branches, one of the biggest library systems in North America, with nearly 1.2 million cardholders and about 10.6 million items in its collection. "One that we all admire incredibly, not only for the building but for their innovation, is Calgary Public," said Mary Chevreau, CEO of Kitchener Public Library.

Calgary is a surprising mecca on the Prairies. It's one of the largest systems in North America, with 57 percent of Calgarians carrying a library card. The new Central Library, which opened in 2018, is an architectural wonder: a six-level ark rising up over a light rail line. A curling tunnel of cedar at the entrance leads patrons into a lofty, pleasingly off-kilter atrium that does the thing that parliaments, cathedrals, and other great buildings are supposed to do: create awe and uplift-the feeling that you are in a place where something of significance is happening. The building was responsible for putting Calgary on the New York Times list of "52 Places to Go" in 2019 and was included in Time magazine's 100 "World's Greatest Places" that same year.

I visited early one morning in February, a mild chinook wind blowing in over the mountains and the building's trapezoidal windows glowing warmly against the electric-blue dawn. At 8 a.m., an hour before opening, a small crowd had already gathered outside the doors. The branch is located in Calgary's East Village and was intended to revitalize a corner of the city that had long been neglected. The Salvation Army is next door, with other drop-ins and social services clustered in the area. Most of the people outside were single men-smoking cigarettes, carrying duffle bags, whiling away the time.

There is a sense of theatre in the moments before the opening of a big public building, a hushed current of anticipation before the action. Inside, workers trickled in, shedding their heavy winter coats and putting on the library's bright-blue vests. In the quiet atrium, you could hear the gentle whirr of the "Bookscalator," a long conveyor belt that shuttles tomes from the return slot downstairs up to the second floor to be sorted. At 8:50, three security guards came down the elevators to their stations by the entrance. And then it was showtime, the doors swinging open and a stream of patrons wandering in-college students clutching iced coffees even in February, thickly bearded middle-aged men who looked like they'd been sleeping rough, a kid in a Spider-Man costume who entered excitedly and then immediately demanded his mother carry him because his "body is tired."

Sarah Meilleur, the forty-three-year-old CEO, took in the scene. Meilleur is a small and sprightly die-hard library nerd who has the Dewey Decimal number for books about librarians tattooed on her ankle. She is a lifer, beginning her time at Calgary Public Library shelving books after university and then slowly working her way to the top job in 2021. "I didn't necessarily think I would be a leader or a CEO," said Meilleur brightly. "I just loved the work. I think, in libraries, you feel like you make a difference every day."

As a bookish only child, Meilleur remembers going down to Memorial Park Library with her parents to get her first library card. That location, a stately building on a landscaped park, was Calgary's first. It was opened in 1912 and funded by Andrew Carnegie, the steel industrialist and philanthropist who used more than $55 million (US) of his fortune, an astronomical number at the time, to build 2,509 public libraries around the world in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, including 125 in Canada. Carnegie, who only donated to municipalities committed to funding the maintenance and operation of the library, catalyzed this country's public system. Often with vaulted ceilings and ornate architecture, Carnegie libraries were designed to inspire the masses. They were places to access books, that great democratizing force. "There was no use to which money could be applied so productive of good to boys and girls who have good within them and ability and ambition to develop it, as the founding of a public library," Carnegie wrote in his autobiography.

In the decades that followed, the core purpose of the library remained the same. People deserved access to books, books were expensive and best shared, and so an entire infrastructure and profession sprung up around that fact. Soon, armies of workers were needed to shelve books and process magazines and journals. Librarianship became a vocation, with attendant degrees and graduate programs and associations.

That version of the library is now gone. "Libraries have seen more change in the past twenty years than at any time in the past hundred," architecture professor Brian Edwards wrote in 2002. The years since have only solidified that transformation. The rise of the internet meant that one of the reference librarian's main functions could now be done with the click of a mouse. RFID tags and other forms of automation meant that those armies of workers were no longer needed behind their desks, sorting books, and would need to find new roles.

At the time, countless articles asked if new technology meant "the death of the public library." Instead, the institution completely transformed itself. Libraries carved out a new role providing online access to those who needed it. They abandoned the big central desk, stopped shushing patrons, and pushed employees out onto the floor to do programming. Today, you'll find a semester's load of classes, events, and seminars at your local library: on digital photography, estate planning, quilting, audio recording, taxes for seniors, gaming for teens, and countless "circle times" in which introverts who probably chose the profession because of their passion for Victorian literature are forced to perform "The Bear Went over the Mountain" to rooms full of rioting toddlers.

In the midst of this transformation, new demands began to emerge. Libraries have always been a welcoming space for the entire community. Alexander Calhoun, Calgary's first librarian, used the space for adult education programs and welcomed "transients" and the unemployed into the building during the Depression. But the past forty years of urban life have seen those demands grow exponentially.

In the late 1970s, "homelessness" as we know it today didn't really exist; the issue only emerged as a serious social problem in the 1980s. Since then, as governments have abandoned building social housing and rents have skyrocketed, homelessness in Canada has transformed into a snowballing human rights issue. Meanwhile, the opioid crisis has devastated communities, killing more than 34,000 Canadians between 2016 and 2022, according to the Public Health Agency of Canada. And the country's mental health care system, always an underfunded patchwork of services, is today completely unequipped to deal with demand. According to the Canadian Institute for Health Information, from 2020 to 2021, Canadians waited a median of twenty-two days for their first counselling session. As other communal support networks have suffered cutbacks and disintegrated, the library has found itself as one of the only places left with an open door.

Today, when Meilleur describes the role of the library, it's as "a place for community connections and a place for people to come together to dream big." It's where people go to fill in online applications for government assistance and print out immigration forms in duplicate. It's a shared office for students and workers stuck in overcrowded apartments. It's one of the last places you can go to warm up or use the washroom, where you won't be hustled along by security or forced to buy something.

If books remain the library's brand, they are no longer its primary focus. In 2015, Calgary trimmed its collection by about 13 percent and relocated tens of thousands of texts from its shelves, according to the Calgary Herald, following a trend of libraries "managing down" their print collections. Many of those books are still available for order, stored off site in a warehouse somewhere, but Calgary's branches themselves are noticeably light on printed material, leaving more space to do the programming, meeting, and hanging out that are now at the core of their mandate.

When people tell the story of this transformation, from book repository to social services hub, it's usually as an uncomplicated triumph. A recent " love letter" to libraries in the New York Times has a typical capsule history: "As local safety nets shriveled, the library roof magically expanded from umbrella to tarp to circus tent to airplane hangar. The modern library keeps its citizens warm, safe, healthy, entertained, educated, hydrated and, above all, connected."

That story, while heartwarming, obscures the reality of what has happened. No institution "magically" takes on the role of the entire welfare state, especially none as underfunded as the public library. If the library has managed to expand its protective umbrella, it has done so after a series of difficult decisions. And that expansion has come with costs.

F rom late 2020 to early 2021, University of Toronto information science professor Siobhan Stevenson conducted a survey of front-line library workers in four public systems in Canada, asking them about their experiences of violence and incivility.

The results painted a picture of a predominantly female profession that could be difficult, traumatic, and sometimes dangerous. About two-thirds of respondents reported feeling unsafe, from a few times a month to a few times a week. As many as 84 percent had been victims of verbal intimidation, while 75 percent had experienced an unwelcome invasion of personal space or physical intimidation. Four percent said they had been the subject of an attempted rape.

"I have been threatened with violence on a number of occasions, knifed and punched in the face," one respondent reported. "Verbal threats of rape, at least once a month," said another. "As time passes, I have felt more unsafe in my workplace-which surprises me," said a third. "I love my job but it has changed dramatically over the last few years for the worse."

One Toronto library worker I spoke with, who asked not to be named for fear of professional reprisal, described conditions many library workers were completely unprepared for and a management slow to admit there was a problem. "So many people go into library school because they have an image that they will be cataloguing or selecting books or dealing with people's reading interests," he said. "No, you're not." The reality, he said, was closer to working in a neighbourhood bar. "Some bars have a quiet clientele. And some are nasty and violent."

These problems aren't unique to libraries. In every public place, the evidence of a social welfare system that has been chipped away at for decades is on display. In early 2023, a series of violent incidents erupted on Toronto transit. The city's response was simple: they threw police at the problem. If you barred a certain category of person from the bus, perhaps the larger systemic issues would take care of themselves.

For both ideological and practical reasons, libraries do not have that option. "We can't lock the door, we're for everyone. So that is the starting point," says Åsa Kachan, CEO of Halifax Public Libraries (and chair of The Walrus's Educational Review Committee). The library's openness is the best thing about it, but it also creates inherent challenges. "The tension is between genuinely wanting to be a welcoming, open space for everyone. And then, at the same time, keeping staff safe," says Stevenson.

According to some workers, management is not doing enough to uphold the second half of that equation. "We have found that there has been an uptick in terms of violent incidents in the libraries, and the library as an employer has been very slow to respond to that," says Brandon Haynes, president of the Toronto Public Library Workers Union. Part of the reason for the slow response, Haynes believes, is management's desire to protect the library's image. "There's a real concern, and I think it's a valid concern, with portraying the library as a safe and welcoming space that's open and accessible to everyone," says Haynes. There are worries that if a beloved institution becomes known as a dangerous, unpleasant place, both visits and funding could suffer. "But I think we can't just hide the voices of the library workers," says Haynes. "I think that in order to address the problem, you need to actually put a spotlight on it and not sweep it under the rug."

The desire to put a good face on things can extend to front-line staff themselves. "This idea that the library is all important and can do no wrong kind of pushes library staff to do more and more and use more and more of their time and energy to the point where folks are burning out," says Heather Hill, chair of the master of library and information science program at Western University.

Talk to library workers and you'll find people eagerly going beyond any reasonable description of their duties. The average library page-the precarious workers, often students, who shelve, tidy, and organize books-makes $16.50 an hour at Toronto Public Library. Librarians-all of whom have master's degrees-earn between $72,054 and $81,372 a year. Both are on the front lines, and both have seen their responsibilities expand, doing work today that might otherwise be done by a social worker, an early childhood educator, a harm-reduction expert, a therapist, or a settlement worker.

In Calgary's Saddletowne branch, Kelly Stinn, a soft-spoken library veteran in a cardigan, told me she was concerned about what she has been seeing since the start of the pandemic. "We're seeing a lot more people that are leaning on the library more heavily, just because the service that might have been there previously is either overextended, changed their mandate, or no longer exists," she says. One patron walked in recently and just burst into tears. She didn't know anyone in Canada, had never had mental health counselling before, and didn't know where to turn. Stinn calmed her down. She set her up with an appointment and asked if she needed a bus ticket or taxi chit to get downtown. "At one point, she just said to me, 'Can I have a hug?'" Stinn remembers. So she gave her a hug.

Stinn was noticing something else as well-an increase of kids in serious mental distress. They were emerging from years of lockdowns and illness with debilitating anxiety. Parents were noticing their children struggling in school. According to the Canadian Mental Health Association, children are experiencing extreme stress due to the pandemic. And three out of four can't get the care they need, either because it's unavailable or not covered by health insurance. Many of them were ending up at the library, and Stinn felt utterly unequipped to help them. So last summer, she started a graduate certificate in children's mental health at the University of Calgary. "At least if I have a better understanding, I can share that with the staff here," she says.

The work of people like Stinn is inspiring. But a country's immigration settlement programs or children's mental health care can't be dependent on underpaid librarians getting extra graduate degrees. Heather Hill points to a 2018 journal article by Fobazi Ettarh, "Vocational Awe and Librarianship: The Lies We Tell Ourselves," that set off conversations among her colleagues. Casting the work of libraries as holy and beyond reproach, Ettarh argues, puts unreasonable, unsustainable expectations on workers to act as saints, as pillars of democracy. "Adding duties like life-or-death medical interventions to already overstrained job requirements is an extreme but very real example of job creep," Ettarh writes. "The library's purpose may be to serve, but is that purpose so holy when it fails to serve those who work within its walls every day?"

The changing atmosphere in libraries can be difficult to talk about. "I think sometimes even library workers and librarians, who are usually left of centre on some level, find their own ideological commitments challenged," says Stevenson. "Nobody wants to say, 'I actually don't want to deal with that overdose in the washroom. I'm not comfortable dealing with someone who is experiencing a serious mental health crisis. I didn't take this job for that.'"

One worker from Winnipeg became emotional when talking to me about her job. (Staff aren't allowed to speak to the press, and the city denied an interview request.) She explained that threats and verbal abuse were common, and dealing with erratic behaviour was par for the course. As a veteran of more than ten years, she wasn't particularly sensitive. But it was clear to her that, in recent years, the library was being asked to do far more than it could sustain. "It just becomes this really small space where all the issues that are in society are just magnified," she said. Staff, she told me, were regularly being retrained in de-escalation techniques, seemingly with the idea that perhaps new training or a new attitude could mitigate the need for more funding or more employees or a functioning supportive housing system. "I spend a lot of time thinking, 'Is this really what my job is now?' And what is the library? I don't even think I know anymore," she said. "I don't remember the last time I actually did my real job."

One of the issues that made her most upset, however, was how her experiences and those of her co-workers were dismissed by advocates who valued the work that libraries were doing with the vulnerable without seeming to value the workers themselves. "I think what makes it worse is to be minimalized and treated like I don't have the right to safety," she said through tears. "I find that extremely hurtful." She'd noticed a lot of early retirements among colleagues. A lot of sick days. A lot of leaves of absence. "People have just gone."

There are no easy solutions to any of this. In early 2019, after staff reported a rise in violent incidents, Winnipeg's Millennium Library took the unprecedented step of introducing airport-style security at its entrance. Patrons were searched with metal-detecting wands. They had their bags checked, with anything deemed dangerous confiscated.

The move led to protests. A community group called Millennium for All produced a report arguing that the presence of heavy security deterred marginalized people from using the library. Would a homeless person, carrying all their possessions, submit to having their bags searched? Would a Black or Indigenous visitor who had bad experiences with the police simply avoid the building? "This barrier leads some of the people who benefit most from library services to avoid the library, effectively limiting their access," the report read.

The number of violent incidents did fall. But so, too, did the number of people using the library. Instead of serving the community, the library was pushing people out into the cold. About a year after they were implemented, the extra security measures were scrapped.

Then, on December 11, 2022, twenty-eight-year-old Tyree Cayer was fatally stabbed after an altercation at Millennium Library. Four teenagers between the ages of fourteen and sixteen were charged with his death. The library closed for about two weeks as administrators tried to figure out how to respond. When it fully reopened, a walk-through metal detector had been installed, and police officers were stationed at the door.

O ver the months I spent writing this story, I drifted from library to library. I set up my laptop in Saddletowne in Calgary as groups of gangly teenagers crunched themselves into tiny nooks in the kids' area because, as the librarian told me, "teens like to be tucked away." I went to my local Toronto branch and let my six-year-old forage for as many books about cheetahs as he could find. I used the free Libby app to borrow a digital copy of The Library Book by Susan Orlean and the free Hoopla app to stream the first thirty minutes of , a well-intentioned but very boring Emilio Estevez movie about a group of homeless people taking over a Cincinnati library. I walked into the soaring atrium of the Toronto Reference Library, probably my favourite building in the city, and was hit with the feeling, so rare in modern life, of being in a beautiful, thoughtful place created and maintained for my benefit-a place that wanted nothing from me other than to make my life marginally better. A public place.

Today, library leaders are recognizing that these public places may have reached the limits of their capacity. According to Pilar Martinez, the CEO of Edmonton Public Library and the chair of the safety and security working group that the Canadian Urban Libraries Council assembled this January, it was time to put some "guardrails" on what libraries ought to be doing with their resources.

There had been talk about a library branch providing clothing to patrons, for example. It was a serious community need, after all, and a place where the library could conceivably step in. But was that their role? And while the three social workers they'd hired in Edmonton had made a huge impact, Martinez said, "that's just not an area that we're going to grow and provide library resources and funding to add additional social workers." Librarians like Martinez were drawing a line. There was the sense, she said, that the Band-Aid solutions they had been trying to provide may even have been obscuring the severity of the problems from governments. It was time to demand help from people outside the building.

"I think what happened is, for a long time, libraries swung in one direction, which is 'We don't do anything but books,'" says Amanda French, the manager of social development at Toronto Public Library. "And then they swung wildly in another direction, which is 'We do everything. We do everything.'" Now she sees libraries swinging back to a more sustainable equilibrium.

That approach, however, requires governments to ease that burden. As libraries have taken on more responsibility, they haven't seen a simultaneous increase in funding. If a public library wants to hire another social worker, does that mean they need to wait for a librarian to leave? Putting cops at the door in Winnipeg rather than hiring more support staff may make sense considering the police's budget is about $327 million, ten times higher than the library system's allocated funds, and this year's police budget increase was about ten times higher too.

Fixing libraries means more funding to bring up staffing levels to give workers the support they need. But it also means doing things that are much more difficult: building more social housing, hiring more social workers, investing in mental health workers, schools, community centres, and everything else needed to address problems before they reach the library's doors. Libraries have proven themselves to be incredibly adaptative, contorting themselves into various shapes to serve the needs of their communities. That's another favourite librarian saying: "A good library reflects its community." But that goes both ways. A troubled community is reflected in its libraries. And if the social problems of twenty-first-century life continue to grow with little restraint, they will inevitably find their way into the city's last public places.

In Palaces for the People, Eric Klinenberg's insightful 2018 book about the importance of "social infrastructure," he writes: "Everyday life in libraries is a democratic experiment." There are few other institutions that take as their constituency everyone. Democracy, of course, is messy. None of that work is magical. It's grinding, difficult, always compromised. But watching a library function-doing the mundane, day-to-day work of accommodating an entire city within its walls-is also remarkable.

That February morning in Calgary, when the doors opened, visitors scattered to every corner of the building. Prince, a twenty-five-year-old international student from Ghana, set up his laptop on the third floor to study, as he does most days. A sixty-seven-year-old retired carpenter browsed the shelves, finally selecting a copy of Anne Applebaum's Twilight of Democracy, before heading downstairs to the cafe to meet a friend. Jeff, a fifty-five-year-old in a big black hoodie, who was staying at the drop-in centre nearby, went straight to the laptop collection on the fourth floor and checked out a Chromebook to look for a landscaping job in the spring.

Sneha, meanwhile, sat at a little wooden table in the children's area with her four-year-old son, Joshya, who was contentedly filling a large sheet of butcher paper with intricate crayon drawings. That morning, they'd come down from their home in the northeast with her husband, who was working at the Salvation Army next door, and now they were spending the day here-reading picture books, choosing DVDs and CDs to take home, using the climbing structure built in the kids' area.

Sneha said that this was Joshya's first time at Central Library, but they were regulars at their home branch. It was the perfect place to bring a kid too young for school, a spot to find playmates. Sneha had been a dentist in India but was still finding her footing here, and through the library, she was taking a free online course in medical office administration that, she hoped, would help lead to work. They'd arrived only a few months before. Everything was still new, and life in a big foreign city could be difficult. But Sneha and her family were doing okay. They had found their way to the library.

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Have You Been to the Library Lately? | The Walrus

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Librarians once worried about shushing patrons. Now they have to deal with mental health episodes, the homelessness crisis, and random violence

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State Library of Iowa Continuing Education

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Libraries and Social Workers: What a Collaboration Could Look Like in Your Library

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Prime Focus: US libraries on the frontlines of homelessness

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Library social worker helps homeless seeking quiet refuge

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Beth Wahler Consulting - Social Work in the Library

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Beth Wahler Consulting - Social Work in the Library

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Beth is a researcher, consultant, trainer, and scholar who studies public library staff and patron needs, trauma-informed librarianship, staff experiences of workplace violence and stress, staff readiness for social services in the library, library-based social work practicum placements, and other types of social work-informed public library interventions and collaborations. She works with libraries of all sizes, from small or rural libraries to urban libraries, as well as both individual and large statewide or regional library organizations to understand staff experiences and challenges, patron needs, and strategies for supporting libraries in the valuable services they provide. Beth has conducted needs assessments of libraries across the United States, has developed and coordinated library-based social work collaborations, supervised library-based student practicum placements, and has provided multiple workshops for public library staff on patron psychosocial needs, trauma-informed librarianship, skill-building for managing challenging patron behavior, and social work collaborations for meeting those needs.

Beth earned her BS in psychology from the University of Evansville, and her MSW and PhD in social work from the University of Kentucky. Prior to her current employment as a consultant and social work administrator/researcher, she has 14 years of previous practice experience working primarily with individuals who struggle with poverty-related needs, mental health challenges, substance use disorders, and intimate partner violence.

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About- Beth Wahler - Social Work in the Library

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Use this space to add a brief description of your project.

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See my recent publication in Public Libraries magazine

I've been researching and writing about social work students conducting their practicum placements in public libraries for several years now. While writing up my recent research for a peer-reviewed journal, a public librarian encouraged me to present my research to a wider audience, through an outlet such as PL Magazine. I'm happy to share that my article with Margaret Ann Paauw, LCSW, went to print recently. I want to acknowledge Dr. Mark Giesler from Saginaw Valley State University as well. He continues to be a partner in this work with Margaret Ann and I.
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Beth Wahler, a faculty member of the Indiana University School of Social Work, has conducted needs assessments with a number of public libraries around the U.S. She has also partnered with social work programs at multiple universities to provide assistance to their students conducting needs assessments as part of their practicum. Dr. Wahler is willing to share the staff and patron surveys she has used with other schools and libraries as needed. She can be reached at bwahler@iu.edu. For more info about her work, please see Wahler et al. (2019) and Provence et al. (2020).

Sources:

Wahler, E. A.,Provence, M. A., Helling, J., & Williams, M. A. (2019). The changing role of libraries: How social workers can help. Families in Society, 101(1), 34-43. https://doi.org/10.1177/1044389419850707

Provence, M. A., Wahler, E. A.,Helling, J., & Williams, M. A. (2020). Self-reported psychosocial needs of public library patrons: Comparisons based on housing status. Public Library Quarterly. https://doi.org/10.1080/01616846.2020.1730738

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Promoting collaboration between social work student interns & public libraries

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Whole-Person Librarianship by Sara Zettervall

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Whole-Person Librarianship by Sara Zettervall

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Join the Email List!

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Where to start: Join the WPL email list to connect with colleagues from around the world.Visit the WPL interactive map to see where collaborations happen.Contact us with any questions or comments.

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by PLA Social Worker Task Force on September 14, 2021

Created by the Public Library Association Social Worker Task Force
Social workers try to "meet their clients where they are." Increasingly, people experiencing life challenges are going to the public library, therefore more libraries are bringing in social work expertise to assist these patrons. While a library/social work partnership may seem like a no-brainer, there is much for a library system to consider before partnering with a social work professional. We'd like to share some of those considerations to help you determine if a social work program could be a good fit for your library. IMPORTANT-Every state is different. People who are trained in these fields have these skill sets but make sure your library is informed about your state's requirements regarding position, titles, and credentialing.
FUNDING

There are three common funding scenarios:

* Grant-funded: library foundation or external;

* Contracting with a social service organization;

* General fund/Embedded: permanent position with the library.

Salary for MSWs and licensed social workers should be in line with the market, industry standards, and experience. Salary should account for required professional expenses such as licensure renewal, liability insurance, continuing education, and clinical supervision. The social worker will require a laptop computer, mobile phone, and access to a printer provided by the library or employing organization. Space should also be considered as the library social worker may need to be located where patrons will feel comfortable having private discussions and confidentiality can be maintained.

Professional Liability insurance: Given the unique nature of the library social worker's role, it is a best practice that they carry liability insurance. Policies may be obtained through the National Association of Social Workers or other companies for an annual fee. It is recommended that the library or other employer organization cover the cost of insurance, if the scope of work is not already covered by existing library policies. Consider this expense when budgeting for a social work position.

Legal responsibility: Social workers are required to report any suspected abuse or neglect of children and/or at-risk adults, as well as threats of harm to self, others, or property. Depending on the level of licensure, social workers may be responsible for enacting involuntary mental health holds under certain criteria. These industry requirements are complex and supersede library confidentiality protocols. Social work professional requirements vary by state.

MODELS

Generally, a library's social work model is the result of an upper-level administrative plan. If direct service is offered at one branch, the model would be focused on direct service. If the library is attempting to create an infrastructure with this program, the model would be leadership driven.

ROLES

Libraries should consider their unique needs and what they want this position to accomplish. Library social work programs vary based on the needs of a community. Community needs assessments can be particularly helpful in getting a clearer picture of a community. Sometimes, libraries have access to community needs assessments that have already been conducted by local social service agencies or universities. Other times, libraries decide to create and carry out their own community needs assessment. Generally, the roles of a library social worker are a blend of the following: staff consultations and trainings, direct patron work, and building community partnerships. Based on the identified needs of both the community and the library, social worker roles can be crafted accordingly.

There are key differences between hosting a social work intern and hiring a social work professional. The main one being that interns are students, and are learning about the field of social work; they are not experts and should not be considered experts. It's important for interns to be supervised by a social worker when possible. When onsite social work supervision is not possible, arrangements for outside supervision must be made with the student's university.

Social workers should provide information and referral to patrons, not case management or therapy. Similarly, social workers should not be expected to work circulation desks or provide customer service as this presents the possibility for dual relationships (e.g., I can't tell a patron they owe the library a late fee and then expect them to come to me with a difficult issue). A former director used to say "I'm a librarian, not a social worker"-the inverse is also true.

FURTHER CONSIDERATIONS

Library leadership should familiarize themselves with the NASW code of ethics and consider the potential conflicts with the ALA code of ethics. NASW section 1.05 may conflict with ALA sections VI and VII depending on personalities, local politics, etc.

Social workers should have consistent access to a private space to meet with patrons, taking into account possible mobility challenges patrons may have. Connecting with other social workers is key, as is external supervision for embedded library social workers. Practicing social work in the library is unique work. Networking with library social workers who share similar successes and challenges is vital as well. The library should allow for and promote these opportunities.

EXPECTATIONS

Often the library's ideas of success are not in line with the social worker's professional measure of success. It is important to manage library staff expectations about the role of the social worker. Maintaining a client's confidentiality is important. When the library would like to know about an interaction between the social worker and a client/patron, the social worker will need to keep the information private. Social workers operate under the premise of self-determination: the idea that a person is responsible for their own journey and their own choices. Social workers are not magicians and can't remove patrons some may find uncomfortable.

Questions? Visit the Social Work Interest Group on ALA Connect at connect.ala.org. The Social Work Interest Group is open to all (you do not need to be an ALA/PLA member, however you may need to create a login).

Tags: social workers in public libraries

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Guidance for Social Work Positions at the Library

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by PLA Social Worker Task Force on September 14, 2021 Created by the Public Library Association Social Worker Task Force Social workers try to "meet their clients where they are." Increasingly, people experiencing life challenges are going to the public library, therefore more libraries are bringing in social work expertise to assist these patrons.

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Social Workers and Librarians— A Case for Why We are BFFs

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By: Amy Schofield, Community Outreach Manager, Richland Library I’m fortunate to work in a library system that values innovation in many forms -- including supporting an entire department of library social workers. In 2014, Lee Patterson, LMSW, was hired with grant funding from the Knight Foundation…

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Why your local library might be hiring a social worker

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Libraries in some cities are investing in staff members who can help patrons with complex issues such as housing insecurity, finding mental health and more.

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OSHKOSH, Wis. (WBAY) - While the library is the perfect place to find a good read or get information, people often forget it's a crucial asset to connecting people with community resources.

Today 11 state libraries are on a mission to go even further to help community members who need it most.

The Oshkosh Public Library says at least once a day employees help connect visitors with resources, whether it's a help line or a warming shelter. While they feel the library has always been a welcoming, non-judgmental place where people can ask questions, the library is providing staff with social work training so they're better prepared in these situations.

"Librarians and social workers are in the business to help people and help them get resources they might need," Jeff Gilderson-Duwe, director of the Oshkosh Public Library, said.

Across the nation, public libraries are adjusting their services to cater to those looking for resources outside of borrowing a book.

"I think a lot of people feel like there are patron needs that we see in the library that. We can't necessarily meet with our traditional methods," said Sara Zettervall. "We do find that folks who come in maybe struggling with homelessness may be having substance abuse issues. They need to be connected with resources in the community."

And the Oshkosh Public Library is not far behind.

"Folks have traditionally come to the library looking for help and assistance, and we just want to be more effective than that. And we think the social work field will offer us some insights that can help us be be more effective at connecting people," Gilderson-Duwe said.

The movement is all thanks to Zettervall's 2019 book, "The Whole Person Librarianship." It highlights just how necessary social worker skills are for library staff.

"Having social services at the ready is another way to connect people with the information that they need and really show that the library cares about the community," she said.

The Eau Claire and Racine public libraries have full-time social workers on their staff.

In Oshkosh, it will be a different approach.

"We are just looking to include these concepts at this point," the library director said, "within a new customer service model that we're designing that will give our staff clear expectations and support as far as how to go about helping people connect with community services."

Gilderson-Duwe says the library has just begun work on this project and details are yet to be determined, but they plan to start official training in just a few months.
Copyright 2022 WBAY. All rights reserved.

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Oshkosh Library staff to get social work training

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The Oshkosh Library says at least once a day staff help to connect visitors with resources such as a help line or warming shelter.

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The WebJunction Course Catalog provides free access to library-focused self-paced courses and webinar recordings. Through the generous support of OCLC and many state library agencies across the United States, WebJunction continues to provide timely and relevant learning content for you to access anytime, from anywhere.

In addition to webinars and courses created through WebJunction, we are pleased to include quality content from other organizations. As part of the California State Library Mental Health Initiative, Infopeople, the education and training branch of Califa, hosted a webinar series, Where Compassion Meets Action, and we're pleased they have allowed us to make these important webinars available in the WebJunction catalog. Be sure to explore all that Infopeople has to offer, including their upcoming webinars.

Click on the webinar titles below to go to each of the webinars in the WebJunction Course Catalog,and remember, with each course or webinar you view from the catalog, you earn a certificate of completion!

Libraries are uniquely situated to offer a place of safety and acceptance, an opportunity for connection, and a rich source of information about mental health and well-being. In this webinar, Barbara Jessing, Mental Health Practitioner and Family Therapist, presents an overview of the concept of trauma informed care and how it applies to the library. We explore the definition and meaning of trauma and the related concept of toxic stress, how it affects early development, and how it can leave a lifelong impact on mental and physical well-being. When we understand the roots of traumatic stress, we are better able to mobilize the positive forces of resilience and create environments that contribute to healing. We also discuss literary aspects of trauma and resilience.

This webinar provides front-line library staff with tools and real library examples to be more effective in meeting mental health challenges that may occur. Attendees learn about creating a supportive environment through connections to community organizations and how to develop more successful communication strategies. Additional discussion includes techniques for identifying patrons in crises and developing evaluation skills and de-escalation plans. Presenters Mary Leasure, Social Services Liaison, and Tiffany Barrios, Library Supervisor from Glendale Public Library examine ways to develop safer, supportive and healthier environments for both staff and the community.

This webinar provides front-line library staff with tools to better understand the mental health challenges that 21st century teens face as they enter school and public library spaces. Presenter Lisa Harris examines the ways that mental health challenges impede the ability for teens to thrive today and look at some real-life examples of libraries at the forefront of the movement to acknowledge these challenges and create spaces in which these challenges are addressed.

In this webinar, UNLV Health Sciences Librarian Xan Goodman, discusses how using a lens of cultural humility can help you become better colleague and a provider of library services to patrons. We look at the connections between mental health and wellness and feelings of value and belongingness, and also the connections between mental health and the three dimensions of cultural humility. At the end of this webinar, you will be empowered to begin your journey of cultural humility and to explore ways you can use the framework of cultural humility in your library with colleagues and patrons.

Gang participation and gang recruitment diverts promising youth to a path of crime and violence-of undesirable shortcuts. Often, such youth end up in the juvenile justice system, caught in a system which forever denies them a future. Understanding the causes of gang involvement is crucial for guiding youth towards positive role models and healthy support systems. In this webinar, presenter Kyle Lee, founder of Pasadena's YES (Youth Empowerment and Strength), explains how his organization is working in gang prevention and intervention. He underscores the most common causes of gang involvement and discuss ways in which libraries can offer themselves as support systems for youth potentially involved with gangs.

The Administration on Aging projects that in 2030, 72.1 million people 65 years or older will live in our country, more than twice the number in 2000. The Alzheimer's Association also reports that more than five million Americans currently live with Alzheimer's disease, and that this number could boom as high as sixteen million in 2050. How does this growing demographic affect libraries, and what library services and programming can we provide to target this population? In this webinar, David J. Kelsey and Lynda Spraner of the St. Charles Public Library's Outreach Services Team, share how they developed all original older adult programming with an emphasis on education, engagement, stimulating the senses, incorporating technology, and having fun. Their team presents more than twenty-five programs a month that reach over three hundred older adults. They discuss how to discover and develop ideas to better serve this growing demographic, no matter the library, community, or budget.

Library staff are tasked with providing more and more services for their communities despite continually shrinking budgets. Often overlooked, is the importance of self-care while doing this work, including the awareness of the effects of trauma and building resiliency. If you have you found yourself feeling drained, growing more irritable or less empathetic in your work you may be at-risk for compassion fatigue. In this session presenter Katie Scherrer discusses compassion fatigue, how to become aware of its symptoms and warning signs, and acknowledge workplace stressors in the library profession that can put us at-risk. We discuss the importance of creating space for self-care in our lives to prevent and/or heal from compassion fatigue, and explore steps for creating a personalized self-care plan. Mindfulness as a specific self-care strategy is explored, with several real-time mindfulness practices interspersed throughout the webinar.

Homelessness and poverty greatly impact the overall health of communities. Libraries are often on the forefront of this challenge in multiple ways, from programs and resources, to providing connections, and partnerships. At the same time, library staff are struggling to be cognizant of the multiple needs of various patrons. Additionally, staff are looking for concrete suggestions on how to serve those who are experiencing homelessness and fulfill their specific information needs. In this webinar, presenter Julie Winkelstein, looks at examples of what other libraries are doing and offer concrete actions your library can take. She discusses barriers to service and top priority needs of library users who are experiencing homelessness.

According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), suicide is the 10th leading cause of death in the United States for all ages. There is one death by suicide every 12 minutes and approximately 123 Americans die by suicide every day. In this webinar, presenter Tana Teicheira, licensed clinical social worker specializing in trauma and suicide prevention, will assist you in understanding suicide statistics and data, reasons and risks related to suicide and strategic interventions and outcomes. She will provide practical skills in how to talk about suicide effectively, understand potential warning signs, ask relevant questions to assess suicide risks as well as access crisis and emergency services. Attendees will learn how and where to engage mental health support and care as well as create proactive prevention environments. to better serve this growing demographic, no matter the library, community, or budget.

Veterans may experience a wide range of mental health conditions after their military service. Statistics show that 37% of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans who receive health care from the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) had a mental health diagnosis, with PTSD being the most common. The VHA reports that veterans are committing suicide at alarming rates: 22 veterans die by suicide every day. Although engaging in VHA mental health treatment has been linked to lower rates of suicide, utilization of mental health services is low. In 2010, only 28% of urban veterans and 22% of rural veterans participated in psychotherapy. Stigma around mental health is often cited as a barrier to seeking support and mental health treatment. In this webinar, presenter Laura Wiedeman, a clinical psychologist at the VA Northern California Health Care System, discusses common mental health struggles that veterans may endure and various ways to provide support. Learn how to help reduce stigma around veteran mental health and become aware of the resources available to veterans in their recovery.

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Where Compassion Meets Action: California State Library Mental Health Initiative Webinar Series

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In addition to webinars and courses created through WebJunction, we are pleased to include quality content from other organizations. As part of the California State Library Mental Health Initiative, Infopeople, the education and training branch of Califa, hosted a webinar series, Where Compassion Meets Action, and we're pleased they have allowed us to make these important webinars available in the WebJunction catalog.