Annual Reflection & Goal-Setting - 2026

 

I've had this blog for ten years now, and every new year I've written a post reflecting on the past year and setting goals for the year ahead. I was hesitant to do that this year as it's been a very tumultuous, difficult year for me (worse than 2020) that began with an ending and I really wasn't sure I wanted to reflect on it. But, I decided maybe that would be the best way to close that chapter once and for all and move on to better things! Fair warning, this is probably going to be a lot to read, but this past year was definitely A LOT!

Around the middle of 2024 I had begun to realize that no matter what or how much I did my work was never going to be valued or appreciated by management, and nothing I did was ever going to be good enough. I struggled with deciding whether to go or stay, because I was proud of all I had accomplished and had grown attached to all my regular patrons, but what started as a generally dysfunctional environment then became overtly hostile, abusive, and deeply toxic. Over the years many of you have thanked me for my honesty in addressing the many challenges and issues we face on this blog, but unfortunately that honesty came with a price and I became the target of retaliation. At the end of January 2025, after weeks of workplace bullying and harassment, things came to a head and I finally left what had begun as my dream job but had become a nightmare. It was truly a bizarre, horrible, and demoralizing experience.

I was so burned out and traumatized I didn't even consider looking for another job for a couple of months. I am very fortunate to have a spouse with a significantly higher income so that I could afford to take some badly needed time off to rest, travel, focus on physical and mental health, and figure out what I was going to do next. One great outcome of this was that after three years of always feeling like I couldn't take time off, I finally got to take several trips I'd been dreaming of and visit my kids. During this time I also got back to a healthy lifestyle, got my blood sugar under control (I'm a type 2 diabetic), lost weight, and I'm in better shape now than I've been in years. It's amazing the damage a toxic environment does, and how much your health improves once you get out of it and away from the constant stress, belittling, and gas-lighting.

Now that I've been away from it and regained perspective, I can see just how toxic my previous workplace really was from the beginning, and I now know I should have left long before I did. I had a hard time letting go of what I thought was going to be my dream job; I kept convincing myself I could make it work, that I just had to work a little harder, do a little more. But now I know there is no way to succeed in a toxic environment, no way to make it work, and nothing you do will ever be good enough. There is no pleasing a toxic, insecure manager; in fact, the better you are at your job the more they will resent you. As much as I hated leaving all the kids and families I had built relationships with, I should have done it much earlier. I now recognize the red flags I should have seen early on and regret passing up other opportunities. As another librarian friend tried to tell me, that library had likely been toxic for so long that they didn't know any other way to be. I didn't want to believe it at the time, but they were so right. 

During my time off I re-evaluated my career and even considered leaving librarianship. I was burned-out, disillusioned, and very disheartened by the continually growing anti-library and anti-librarian movement and the realization that the great managers I'd had earlier in my career were probably the exception rather than the rule. But after I had time to rest and recover, I realized I wasn't ready to give it up just yet. I still loved being a children's librarian; I just needed to find a workplace where I would be valued and treated with respect, and a position where I had a more manageable workload and could maintain healthier boundaries and work/life balance. 

After three months I began job-hunting, focusing on children's librarian positions in branches of larger library systems that would have centralized collection development and centralized summer reading planning and support. While I believe these are both very important and am proud of all the work I did developing a vibrant and diverse collection and a robust, evidence-based summer reading program, I realized that one person can't do it all, and I am content to have others perform those functions. I would prefer to focus on branch programming, day-to-day customer service, outreach, and building relationships with patrons. Also, being in a branch of a system puts some distance between you and upper admin, which I've learned is generally a good thing, making it much easier to keep your head down, focus on your job, maintain a more positive attitude, and ignore the BS.

Luckily, I found a position relatively quickly, and started my new job in early June. I am now the children's librarian at a smaller neighborhood branch in a larger system. I primarily assistant patrons, plan and conduct children's programs, and do outreach. I do some weeding, but I am not responsible for collection development; I do branch programming during the summer, but am not responsible for planning and designing the whole summer reading program. I also do not have any supervisory duties, which is something else I was happy to give up. I did take a small pay cut, but also a significant cut in responsibility and workload. The best part of my new position is that I am part of a great youth services team. My supervisor is a former youth librarian and really understands my job and all that it entails, and is very supportive. The teen librarian started at the same time I did and we have a great working relationship, providing support, advice, assistance, or just a sounding board for each other; there is none of the territorial behavior, competition, undermining, bulldozing, gas-lighting, or duplicity that I experienced at my last job. My stress and anxiety levels are so much less now!

The position is not without its challenges; no situation is perfect. I had to learn a whole new organizational structure and culture. We are understaffed and have a much smaller programming budget than I'm used to. There is not enough work or storage space, and our program/meeting room is way too small. It is challenging to get families to attend storytime, though I do get decent attendance at family and elementary programs most. While our library is used by the community fairly heavily for internet and other technology access and assistance, our circulation is very low (though it has gone up in the last few months!). The library is in a lower income community that is very diverse, with many that do not speak English fluently, so we frequently have to find ways around language barriers to help people, which can be very challenging, but also rewarding. But overall, the lower stress level far outweighs any of the challenges. Plus I got to meet Mychal Threets!

I have found that while I still want to be a children's librarian, I do not quite have the same level of passion for it as I used to, which honestly is probably more healthy. I give it my best for 40 hours a week, but no longer do I give it my all. I have accepted that sometimes "good enough" is good enough. A wise librarian once told me "don't let perfect be the enemy of good", and I now really understand what that means, and how important it is to be able to let go of frustrations and perfectionist ideals. I am going to focus on doing my job, but now I see it more as just that, a job. I have finally shrugged off the sense of vocational awe many of us have, and after five years as a professional librarian I no longer have the naïve idealism of someone new to the profession. I now have a more balanced approach; I am committed to doing a good job without making it my whole identity, re-defining success, and trying to resist the desire for external validation (though that's a tough one for me).

My goals for the upcoming year are pretty basic:

• continue prioritizing my health above everything else
• continue to maintain healthy boundaries and work/life balance
• continue getting to know the community and try to better understand their needs
• develop relationships within the community and the library system
• work on organization and time management
• increase storytime attendance
• increase outreach
• develop two new programs for 5&U
• Imagination Station - themed activities and dramatic play to encourage imagination, exploration, expressive language, and socio-emotional skills
• STEM Storytime- storytime that focuses on developing problem-solving and critical-thinking skills, inspiring wonder and curiosity, and modeling a growth-mindset with pre-math and science activities.
• maintain and possibly expand family & elementary programming
• take vacation time!
• go hiking at least once a month (this is my therapy!)
• read at least 1 book a month
• walk at least 3 days a week
• go to the gym at least once a week

Unfortunately, maintaining healthy boundaries and a healthy work/life balance means I probably won't be blogging that much, but I also don't want to give it up entirely, either. 

Wishing us all good health and peace in the coming year!

Happy New Year! 🎊🎆

Time Audit Continued - Another Month in the Work Life of a Children's Librarian

 

In a previous post I described conducting a time audit and the results of the first month (November). I found the time audit helpful and decided to continue tracking my time. I made a few changes to make it easier and less time consuming, and combined some categories. Before I was logging everything on paper and doing calculations by hand, which took a lot more time that I had expected. I liked being able to have a paper log on a clipboard that I could keep handy, so I came up with a hybrid method using a simplified paper log to quickly jot down what I was doing and for how long, and then would enter it into a spreadsheet later, and set up a pivot table to figure out all the totals, and a pie chart that I could update as I went along.

Once again, the categories and sub-categories I used are below:

• Programming
• Researching - Looking for ideas, checking out performers, testing activities, etc.
• Planning - When, what, and how activities will be done, making written plan, ordering/buying supplies
• Prep/Set Up - Prepping materials, setting up room, putting things out, making signs, writing & printing directions, making slides, etc.
• Execution - The actual program
• Clean Up/Take Down - Putting things away, cleaning, putting furniture back
• Administrative - Putting events in calendar, recording attendance, compiling stats, marketing 
• Outreach
• Researching - Looking for potential clients/partners and making initial contacts
• Planning - Planning specific activities and making written plan
• Preparation - Getting everything ready to go, pulling books to take
• Execution - The actual outreach visit or event
• Administrative - Scheduling, recording attendance, compiling stats
• Collection Management
• Maintenance - Weeding, ordering replacements, un-"NEW" ing
• Development - Selection, patron requests, ordering
• Marketing - Displays, bibliographies, reviews, social media spotlights, etc.
• Customer Service
• Children's Desk - assigned to children's service desk
• Main Circ Desk - assigned to main circ desk
• Spontaneous - When stopped by patrons needing help while on the floor or walking through, stepping in at desk during busy times to help.
• Professional Development - conferences, webinars, courses, workshops, reading professional journals, trade magazines, blogs
• Training & Supervising of Staff - Providing training for, giving instructions to, answering questions from, or evaluating direct report and other staff
• Administrative - Time spent on time audit and any other paperwork, reporting, or managerial duties not specifically related to programming, outreach, collection work, or supervising direct report; general meetings, email, and phone calls.
• Breaks - brief paid breaks taken on the clock, not counting quick trips to the restroom less than 5 minutes
• Other - All the unexpected miscellaneous stuff that comes up, all the conversations with coworkers not directly or exclusively related to any of the other categories, decorating the department, cleaning, organizing, etc. Anything that doesn't fit the above categories but is still work-related. Conversations that were exclusively social in nature are recorded as breaks.

And here are the results for January, which ended up being closer to 3 weeks than 4 due to holidays and snow days:

This month was more balanced that the previous one, with a little less time spent on programming and more spent on collection work and outreach. This is pretty close to what I think it should be, though ideally, I would like to spend more time on customer service and less time in meetings. Logging time spent at the service desk was also a bit of a conundrum, since I often work on other projects when it's slow. I ended up logging time spent on projects while at the desk under the relevant categories, so the actual time spent at the service desk isn't accurately represented here. 

Taking a closer look at programming shows once again that time spent in the execution of the program is only the tip of the iceberg:

Compared to November, I spent even less time on the execution of programs and more on researching and planning. This is due to one of the weekly storytimes being taken over by another staff member and my spending a lot of time on booking performers for summer and researching ideas for in-house programs for summer, in addition to planning programs for March and April. During this time period I did the weekly toddler storytime, monthly Pokemon and Lego programs, a family craft program, and 2 Kidbrarians for a total of 8 programs.

I really found continuing the time audit to be very helpful. Updating the pie chart each day was very helpful in setting priorities and deciding what to focus on when I found I had a nice chunk of un-scheduled time with no urgent deadlines, This kept collection work and professional development from being inadvertently pushed to the back burner, and forced me to be more decisive in programming and collection development, rather than over-researching and going down rabbit holes.

Now that I have a system set up that works for me, I am going to continue until I have a year's worth of data. I think it will be interesting to see how much the distribution changes from month to month, and the yearly averages over all. 

Time Audit - A Month In the Life of a Children's Librarian

 

As I mentioned previously, we were recently required to do a time audit where I work. If you aren't familiar with time audits, it involves tracking how much time is spent on different activities, tasks, and/or projects and analyzing to spot trends and improve efficiency. Time audits are a bit tedious, take time in and of themselves, and can make staff feel distrusted and micro-managed when assigned by management, but I do think they can be valuable. In fact, I'd coincidentally started doing one on my own shortly before all full-time staff were asked to do them by the director. I'll give a breakdown of how I did my time audit, how my time was spent over a four-week period, and how I hope to use this information.

We were asked to record everything we did all day long by task, duration, and category, and total each category by day and by week. I took it a step further and did totals and percentages over a month, as I felt that would be a more accurate representation since there is so much variation day to day, and even week to week. We were allowed to decide if we wanted to record on paper or set up a spreadsheet, and to set whatever categories made the most sense for our department and jobs. I found it easier and more accurate to set up a chart on paper on a clipboard I could keep handy, but then I had to do all the calculations myself, which was time-consuming.

The categories (and sub-categories for some) I used are below:

• Programming
• Researching - Looking for ideas, checking out performers, testing activities, etc.
• Planning - When, what, and how activities will be done, making written plan, ordering/buying supplies
• Prep/Set Up - Prepping materials, setting up room, putting things out, making signs, writing & printing directions, making slides, etc.
• Execution - The actual program
• Clean Up/Take Down - Putting things away, cleaning, putting furniture back
• Administrative - Putting events in calendar, recording attendance, compiling stats, marketing 
• Outreach
• Researching - Looking for potential clients/partners and making initial contacts
• Planning - Planning specific activities and making written plan
• Preparation - Getting everything ready to go, pulling books to take
• Execution - The actual outreach visit or event
• Administrative - Scheduling, recording attendance, compiling stats
• Collection Management
• Maintenance - Weeding, ordering replacements, displays, un-"NEW" ing
• Development - Selection, patron requests, ordering
• Customer Service
• Children's Desk - assigned to children's service desk
• Main Circ Desk - assigned to main circ desk
• Spontaneous - When stopped by patrons needing help while on the floor or walking through, stepping in at desk during busy times to help.
• Professional Development - conferences, webinars, courses, workshops, reading professional journals, trade magazines, blogs
• Training & Supervising of Staff - Providing training for, giving instructions to, answering questions from, or evaluating direct report and other staff
• Meetings - General meetings; any meetings specifically about programming or outreach are recorded under those categories
• Email/Phone Calls - general; emails/phone calls specifically about programming or outreach are recorded as administrative duties under the respective category
• Administrative - Time spent on time audit and any other paperwork, reporting, or managerial duties not specifically related to programming, outreach, collection work, or supervising direct report.
• Breaks - brief paid breaks taken on the clock, not counting quick trips to the restroom less than 5 minutes
• Other - All the unexpected miscellaneous stuff that comes up, all the conversations with coworkers not directly or exclusively related to any of the other categories, decorating the department, cleaning, organizing, etc. Anything that doesn't fit the above categories

I was told I should be spending 40% of my time on programming, 25% on outreach, 20% on collection management, 10% on professional development, and 5% on administrative tasks. However, this doesn't account for meetings, training & supervising direct reports, customer service, communication, all the "other" things I do as part of my job like decorating, cleaning and organizing, talking to coworkers, and yes, breaks. The math simply doesn't math, and I don't know how I'm supposed to reconcile that, but hopefully the time audit will help.

After tracking my time for 4 weeks, I totaled everything and calculated percentages, which I've shown below for all the main categories. As you can see, the reality was very different from the expectations we were given:

Since over half of my time was spent on programming, let's take a closer look at programming specifically, and all that it entails. During this 4-week period I was responsible for 15 programs: 6 regular storytimes, 2 special expanded storytimes, Pokémon Club, Lego Club, homeschool hangout (in collaboration with YA librarian), a special STEM program, a Halloween party, and two Kidbrarians. In addition, I had the ongoing passive Dinovember program, which required staging our toy dinosaurs and posting photos twice a week, and had to plan upcoming programs. 

We all know that there is more that goes into programming than just the time spent in the actual programs, so I used multiple sub-categories in my time audit to reflect that and really get a clearer picture of where my time was going. Below is the breakdown of how much time I spent on each aspect of programming:

As you can see, the time spent in the actual program is only the tip of the iceberg, and more than two hours of additional time go into making every hour of program happen. And that's not including the labor from other staff assisting. If I didn't have any help, it would be at least a 3:1 ratio, if not more. This was no surprise to me, and I'm sure it is not a surprise to anyone else who regularly does programming. 

I'm not at all surprised by most of these results, in fact. I already knew I spent a significant amount of time on programming, at the expense of collection management, outreach, and customer service, and I also knew there were many "other" aspects to my job that the expectations above didn't account for. But now I have some data to back that up. 

I do feel the time audit has been useful, and being forced to write things down has helped me stay more focused and on task. I know I still need to work on better organization, time management, and advance planning, and as I improve in those areas I will be able to shift some more time back to collection development, which had been pushed to the back burner over the last year due to staffing issues. I am also turning the weekly preschool storytime over to the part-time children's assistant, as well as some of the summer programs, which will free up time for me to add 1-2 more outreach visits per month. I am expected to add more programs for 4th-6th graders in the fall, and I hope by that time I will be able to delegate at least one monthly program in order to free up time for that.

I'm told that I need to delegate more of the "other" tasks and more of the programming prep, and I'm trying, but it's hard to delegate when you don't have enough reliable staff with the right skills available when you need them. I really think we need additional qualified youth services staff besides myself and one part-time assistant to pick up some of the programming and "other" duties, as well as cover the children's service desk consistently to provide better customer service by having the desk staffed when people are in the department. Currently, the children's service desk is rarely staffed, and I think that besides not being very welcoming, it hurts our circulation by not having a qualified person readily available in the children's department to provide reader's advisory and other assistance, and doesn't allow us to build relationships with, and get valuable feedback from, patrons that use the children's department. In addition, I have observed that having a consistent staff presence also encourages more appropriate behavior and results in much less mess and destruction.

I plan to continue tracking my time to get a more accurate picture of how I spend my time by tracking over a longer time period, since every month is a bit different. One month might be heavier in professional development if I attend a conference, summer is heavier in programming, and some months just seem to have a whole lot of "other". This particular month was heavier in programming because of Dinovember, and heavier in "other" because of changing seasonal décor and unpacking and setting up the furniture and accessories for our new dramatic play area. My hope is that once I have improved my organization and time-management and I have more data I can demonstrate everything I am doing, how much time programming really takes, and that we really do need more staff in order to do more programming and outreach (which I agree the community needs). 

Has anyone else done a time audit? How did it go, and were you surprised by the results? What do you find taking up the bulk of your time? How were the results used? Any great time-management tips? Anyone know a great, flexible time-audit form/template that is easy to adapt to the categories you need and does all the calculations for you? I am finding doing it by hand takes far more time than I'd imagined, so I'm planning on switching to a digital format.

Annual Reflection & Goal Setting - 2025

 

I've now been working in public libraries for 12 years (in March), writing this blog for nearly 10 years, and have been a degreed, professional librarian for four years. Every year before I write my annual reflection and goal setting post I review the previous few years. Every year since 2020 I have hoped the new year would bring some peace, but it never seems to quite work out that way, and this year was no exception. 

2024 was another difficult year, with many changes and challenges, including an unexpected restructuring and changing of job descriptions so that I am no longer a youth services manager over birth through teen (that position was eliminated), and am now the children's librarian, for birth through 6th grade. A new YA librarian position was created for teens and new adults (now as a separate department), and the vacant adult services manager position was also re-classified as just a librarian position rather than a manager. I no longer have the same level of autonomy I had before and now have to work under a very autocratic management style, which is not a management style I personally thrive under. All the changes were very unexpected and have been difficult to get used to, but it is what it is and I'm adjusting my expectations accordingly.

However, it wasn't all bad; some good things did happen and I was able to accomplish some of my goals, as well as others:

• I was finally able to fill the children's assistant position that had been vacant for a year.
• My programming budget, which had been slashed by the previous director, was returned to the previous level.
• Asked for and received additional storage cabinets in the program room, more than doubling our storage space, and finally have everything pretty well-organized.
• Also received an additional storage cabinet and shelving for my office. Still working on getting that all organized, but made significant progress.
• I was finally able to attend the ALSC conference. It was really great to spend a couple of days among my fellow children's librarians from all over the country and share ideas and experiences! (I was also very flattered when one person recognized me from my published research article and another recognized me from this little blog.)
• Finished the deep-dive into incentivized reading research I'd been wanting to do for a few years and wrote an article about the problems with traditional, heavily incentivized reading programs, as well as one on what we should do instead, complete with annotated bibliography.
• Had a very successful summer program, which though very busy, was also more enjoyable than stressful.
• Increased programming, developing a very well-received "Kidbrarian" program, adding a monthly Bricks, Blocks, Build! program for all ages (Legos, Duplos, Mega Bloks, and various other building sets/toys) and adding a monthly homeschool hangout-type program in collaboration with the new YA librarian.
• Was asked to give two presentations at our state youth services conference, one on STEM programming for younger children, and the other on my Kidbrarian program.
• Collection management was pushed to the back-burner a bit this year due to all the changes and staffing issues, but after having gone through several rounds of weeding the entire youth collection based on circulation the previous two years, I was able to review the board books, picture books, and early readers based on condition, and after weeding and shifting aggressively so that shelving followed best practices I freed up a significant amount of space to start expanding the picture book collection.
• Conducted a survey on youth services burnout, the possible factors contributing to it, and how youth services staff could be better supported. This is a major issue across the field, needs to be addressed, and we should be able to discuss it without fear of retaliation, though sadly that's not always the case.
• Developed collaborative relationships with the new YA and adult services librarians.
• Was finally able to clear out enough space and purchase furniture and accessories for the dramatic play area I've wanted to add since I arrived three years ago (pictured below)!!
  
  

Now, looking forward to 2025, some of the things I want to accomplish are:

• Work on organization, time-management, and planning further ahead. I've realized that to do this, I have to carve out dedicated time on my schedule for organizing and planning. Once I'm on top of that, I believe the time-management will take care of itself.
• Work on delegating more tasks, though this is very challenging because most of the time there isn't enough staff with the skills required who have the time and are available at the time I need them. 
• Keep my office reasonably neat and organized.
• Now that the new children's assistant is fully trained and ready, I am turning the weekly preschool storytime over to her in order to do more outreach, as well as having her take the lead on one program during spring and fall breaks, and a few programs during the summer, again helping me gain a more appropriate balance on where my time is going.
• Get back to spending an appropriate amount of time on collection management.
• Have summer reading all planned even earlier this year, by April 1st.
• Add regular programming specifically for 4th-6th graders in September.
• Attend the state public library and youth services conference, but probably not present. Though I like making a professional contribution to the field, it isn't supported in my position and presentation prep is done mostly on my own time.
• Continue tracking time and compiling data to document everything I'm doing and attempt to demonstrate the need for more staff in order to increase programming and outreach and offer better customer service (more on this in an upcoming post).
• As always, working towards a better work/life balance, trying to figure out how to leave work at work and not let work stress cause so much anxiety that it robs me of sleep, negatively affects my physical and mental health, and interferes with my life outside of work as it does now.

And once again, I hope for peace. I crave stability, calm, and a healthy work environment. But I don't know if that exists anywhere anymore. So I guess I need to instead hope for acceptance, being able to let go, not care as much, being able to compartmentalize more? The other thing I noticed in reviewing all my previous new year's posts is how the tone has changed and one can clearly see the trauma and burnout developing over the last few years. I'm not sure what the answer is, but in the meantime I'll keep trying to focus on the joy I find in working with the kids and families and building healthier boundaries. I still love being a children's librarian, just wish it wasn't as stressful and exhausting as it's been. 

Anyone else want to share 2024 accomplishments they're particular proud of? Let's normalize taking pride and voicing our accomplishments and celebrating each other!! Any exciting goals for 2025?

Happy New Year!!

A Day In the Life of a Children's Librarian

As I've said before, there really is no such thing as a "typical" day as a children's librarian; every day is different. One day is mostly researching and planning programs, another day may be mostly meetings, another may be a combination of customer service and collection development, and another may be a little bit of a whole bunch of different things. The only thing they have in common is that I rarely get everything done on my to-do list due to things taking longer than expected, or all the unexpected things that inevitably pop-up and require my attention, and pretty much every day has at least some time spent on programming-related tasks.

Since we were recently required to conduct a time-audit, I have an almost exact, down to the minute, accounting of how I spent my time over a 6-week period, so I'll be able to give a very detailed report of this "typical" Wednesday in November:

• 9:00a - clocked-in, and immediately went to work staging a photo of the toy dinosaurs getting into mischief as part of "Dinovember" (45 minutes)
• 9:45a - checked email (10 min)
• 9:55a - completed policy acknowledgement form (required of all staff anytime a policy is introduced, or changed) and turned in (5 min)
• 10:00a - Worked on book order for patron requests and upcoming programs (25 min)
• 10:25a - Going over storytime planning, resources, and early literacy skills with staff member who will be taking over preschool storytime in Jan (50 min)
• 11:15a - Browsed catalogs with co-worker, looking at furniture and items for proposed dramatic play center (30 min)
• 11:45a - Stopped to answer questions from staff member (15 min)
• 12:00p - Met with teen librarian regarding programming in general, and specifically about a new program launching in 2 weeks that we are collaborating on, and another new program we have been asked to develop (1hr 15 min)
• 1:15p - Lunch (unpaid, 1 hr)
• 2:15p - Walked through children's department to check on things, realized we were out of scavenger hunt sheets, and printed more (15 min)
• 2:30p - Edited staged dinosaur photos from earlier, created a social media post drafts with dino photos and results of kids' vote for favorite dinosaur character from previous day, emailed marketing specialist to let him know they need to be published, and followed up in person (1 hr)
• 3:30p - Kidbrarian appointment (gave kid tour, helped them select books for a display and design a sign for it; 1 hr 15 min)
• 4:45p - Pulled books for monthly book bin to drop off at daycare during outreach visit the next day (40 min)
• 5:30p - Clock out & go home.

This was one of those days I did a little bit of everything: program planning, program prep and set up, program execution, program admin & marketing, outreach prep, collection development, training & supervision of staff, and miscellaneous admin, though just over half of my time was spent on programming in some form or fashion.

I did end up working half an hour over, because I just couldn't quite get everything done in our normal 7-hour workday, and pulling books for the outreach visit had to be done before the next morning. One thing the time audit has helped me realize is that (1) I need to carve out time for the things other than programming, and (2) I need to plan my time and plan ahead a little better, but more on that in another post. 

You also might notice I did not take any paid breaks on this day. Some days I am just too busy, other days I don't feel I need one, but if I do take them when I feel I need one. This is usually on days when I've been on my feet for an extended time, doing more physical or stressful work, or have very busy, hectic programs. Many times I give myself a break just by doing something different, like covering the children's service desk for a while, changing out a display or something, or just taking a quick lap through the library checking in with staff and patrons. If I need a snack, I usually eat it at my desk while working, and I don't count the literal 2 minutes it takes to go to the restroom to pee and wash my hands (yes, I timed it) as an official break.

A Day in the Life of a Children's Librarian

 

We are now in the thick of summer reading, when kids and family programming doubles and we have increased foot traffic. It is very busy and exhausting, but luckily only for two months; I'd never be able to sustain this amount of programming year-round without additional programming staff.

This was a day when we had a performer coming in, which you would think would give me a break, but though I don't have to plan a program I still spend a lot of time and energy on set-up and take-down of the meeting room and interacting with people. In addition, I had not one, but two, meetings. Although every day is different, I'd say this was a fairly typical day during summer reading. So here's how it went:

• 9:00a-9:15a - Arrive to work, clock-in, check e-mail, check schedules.
• 9:15a-10:00a - Lower thermostats in meeting rooms, clear out all the tables and set up chairs. Make a few adjustments after performer arrives at their request. (Fortunately, a co-worker who arrived earlier had already started this for me and another arrived to help when she had to return to the desk; without help this would have taken much longer.)
• 10:00a-10:15a - Check both service desks and info table to see if they are sufficiently stocked with summer reading brochures and reading challenge sheets; get clicker-counter and performer's check from office, refill water.
• 10:15a-10:30a - Return to meeting room, give performer check, and open doors for audience to enter and be seated, count attendees.
• 10:30a-11:15a - Make opening announcements, then stay in room for show to monitor.
• 11:15a-12:00p - Rush to meeting with reps from science center (who were 45 minutes early!) about traveling exhibit we are to host in the fall.
• 12:00p-1:00p - Looked over books assistant had pulled for me for consideration for next week's storytime, covered children's service desk, re-filled displays and summer reading info, asked another staff member to put tables back in meeting rooms and return to normal arrangement, checked e-mail, recorded program attendance stats, assisted patrons.
• 1:00p-2:00p - Lunch
• 2:00p-3:00p - Checked in with staff member who was just beginning shift at children's desk, discussed scheduling off-desk time for them to participate in webinar the following day, various administrative tasks, prepared for upcoming meeting, prepared books to be dropped off at daycare next day.
• 3:00p-4:00p - Management team meeting, discussed changes in purchasing, program planning, and marketing, upcoming performance reviews, and departmental updates.
• 4:00p-5:00p - Reviewed plans & preparations for next morning's elementary program and re-arranged tables & chairs in program room to be ready, put away materials left from previous programs, general tidying. Pulled a few more books for displays, checked in with various staff, checked-email, checked library's social media.
• 5:00p - Clock out & go home.

That's most of it, anyway. I am sure there are things I have forgotten, as well as multiple quick conversations with co-workers and patrons while passing through, trips to the printer, short breaks for the restroom, water, or a snack, etc. It's all kind of a blur by the end of the day.

This was one of those days where I am busy non-stop, going from one thing to the next with very little downtime in between. I enjoy those days because they go by quickly, I'm too busy to get tired, and I'm usually interacting with a lot of people, but I am glad that every day is not like that or I would never have time for planning, collection work, and professional development. Plus, being a true introvert, I need some down-time with less interaction to recharge. 

I enjoy the busy-ness of summer reading, though I wish I was not the sole person responsible for planning ALL kids and family programs. Maybe by next summer one of our new youth services staff will be ready and willing to taking on some programming themselves. I'd still be there to help and guide, but it would be nice to have someone else be able to take lead on a few things and genuinely participate in overall planning. I find the *planning* of summer reading to be incredibly stressful! By the time it's actually here, it's a relief and just busy rather than overly stressful.

A Day in the Life of a Children's Librarian

This was a busy day with two programs, an interview, business lunch, and management meeting! There's really no such thing as a "typical" day as every day is a little bit different, which is one of the things I love about working in public libraries.

• 9:00am - Arrive at work, clock in, check e-mail, check desk schedules. Drop by assistant director's office to pick up interview questions for later. Post storytime reminder on Facebook.
• 9:20-10:30am - Prep for storytime. Set up chairs, got out bubbles, shaker eggs, and speaker. Filled sensory bin with water (along with frogs, fish, ducks and lily pads). Select toys for playtime after storytime. Filled water bottle and made quick trip to restroom.
• 10:30-11:00am - Toddler Storytime! (co-worker stepped in for playtime so I could go to interview.)
• 11:00am-12:00pm - Participated in interviewing of candidate for adult services librarian position.
• 12:00-1:00pm - Took candidate out to lunch with rest of interview panel
• 1:00-3:00pm - Covered service desk in youth services, during which I checked & responded to e-mail, began selecting books on requested themes to take to daycare later in week, and checked in with staff.
• 3:00-3:45pm - Met with rest of management team to discuss the candidate we interviewed earlier, and other personnel matters.
• 3:45-4:00pm - Opened up room and set up for Pokémon Club, walked through library informing potential attendees of location (a change from previous month)
• 4:00-5:00pm - Pokémon Club
• 5:00-5:15pm - Cleared out and locked up meeting room, recorded attendance, checked e-mail, and checked in with assistant director before leaving for the day.

And as always, I'm sure there are several quick tasks and short conversations with various staff and/or patrons that I've forgotten to include. 

A Day in the Life of a Children's Librarian

 

This was a Monday. I generally do not do programs on Mondays and use them for planning and prep, and easing into the week.

Today we were short-staffed so I covered the service desk in the children's department most of the morning, from 9:30a-1pm. During this time I also:

• did a walk-thru to be sure shelves were tidy & face-outs on the shelves
• changed out the weekly scavenger hunt
• changed out a display
• took up/down pictures of animals off the floor and wall and the jumping distance labels left from Leap Day
• set up a table with info for our Peeps diorama contest, with signage and décor to attract attention
• checked for new purchase requests
• left the desk for a brief meeting with the director and assistant director
• looked at a new Indiana Jones version of Monopoly I had just purchased to serve as inspiration for this summer's "Bookopoly" reading challenge (it will go into our circulating collection of games at the end of the summer)
• checked in with another staff member to see if they could cover the playtime after storytime the next day as I was needed to help interview a candidate for our open adult services librarian position.
• and probably a few other little things I've forgotten

Lunch roughly from 1:00p-2:00p. 

In the afternoon from 2-5pm:

• touched base with both part-time teen/tween programmers about their upcoming programs, how things were going, and assigned tasks for the afternoon.
• emailed daycares to confirm visits for later this week
• planned the next day's storytime and printed programs
• discussed candidates we would be interviewing with AD, and likelihood of having to modify the position and re-post 
• informed AD that one of the daycares had responded that they no longer wanted visits, with no explanation, and discussed how to respond.
  

Left shortly after 5:00pm. 

I'm sure I've forgotten various minor tasks, brief conversations with staff about various things, time here and there looking up ideas, but that is a "typical" day in a nutshell. I put "typical" in quotes, because there really is no such thing as typical; every day is different! That's one of the things I have always like about working in public libraries; every day is a little bit different.

On the Struggle Bus

You may have noticed this blog has been pretty quiet lately, and unfortunately the reason for that is that I have been feeling completely exhausted and unmotivated, a passenger on the struggle bus that seems to be on an infinite route with no stops. I seem to be mired in a full-blown existential crisis, both personally and professionally. I feel like nothing I do really matters, and furthermore, nothing I have ever done really mattered. 

This has been building for a while, and many factors play into it, but I think the professional crisis began in 2020 when the pandemic hit just as I was finishing my MLIS, and the library system I had worked in for seven years suddenly terminated me (and 100 others) with no warning, no consideration, and absolutely no sensitivity. I always knew upper management viewed most of us as anonymous, disposable cogs rather than people, but to be actually thrown away without a second thought like that was devastating. I cried and mourned the loss of job I loved for a couple of days, but then threw myself into job-hunting, and I don't think I every fully realized or dealt with how traumatic that experience was for me. I know others were not so affected, but it affected me deeply.

I managed to land on my feet, finding a full-time professional position relatively quickly, but it proved not to be a good fit, and a year later landed what I thought was going to be my dream job. But due to understaffing, toxic management, a public that has grown meaner, more entitled, and less appreciative; and libraries being under constant attack, I am finding myself feeling exhausted, stressed, undermined, and unappreciated most of the time, and I have a hard time mustering any enthusiasm or excitement for things that used to routinely bring me joy. Work was my "happy place" in pre-pandemic days, an escape from stresses in my personal life; now it is just an even greater source of stress.

Another thing that I'm struggling with besides accepting that pre-pandemic life and the career I thought I was going to have are gone and everything is different now, is realizing that while certain experiences and people were significant and important to me, I was barely a blip on their radar. I know in my head that's normal and often the case as life goes on and everyone has their own lives and issues to deal with, but it still hurts sometimes.

Yesterday I visited the library where I used to work, where I truly loved working and was inspired to become a children's librarian, and I walked in and didn't see a single friendly or familiar face. So much has changed in the last 3 years, and it no longer looked or felt like the same place. I no longer felt comfortable there, or even welcome, really. It just hit me all at once, realizing that while the time I worked there and the relationships I had (in that branch & the system overall) were incredibly meaningful to me and I was very proud of the work I had done, the library had moved on without me and not only is it no longer the place or people I remember, no one really remembers me or anything I did while I was there anymore. I felt completely erased and insignificant, and I left and went to my car and cried.

I know I need to stop living in the past, let go of what might have been, what should have been, and just accept that everything is different now and that I need to move on like everyone else has. Sometimes people are more important to you than you are to them, and that's just how life goes. I need to learn how to stop defining myself by my accomplishments, my job, my relationships, or how others see me, and do a better job of having healthier boundaries and leaving work at work, but after a lifetime of being a type A classic overachiever, never feeling like I'm enough, and being in a field where vocational awe and poor leadership are so toxically pervasive, it's hard. 

I can certainly see why people are leaving the library field, especially youth services, in droves. Now is not a good time to be a librarian in general, and though all public librarians are generally overworked, underpaid, and under-appreciated, I think children's librarians are the most prone to burnout due to the excessive programming demands that so often goes along with youth services. We are expected to be everything for everybody, without the staffing or funding to do so, with a public that has grown more entitled and less appreciative, kids that are so much more challenging to engage, parents that often don't parent, and upper management that is often out of touch and unsupportive, and frequently downright toxic. Some days I'm tempted to just chuck it, and let not-so-distant-future me deal with not having enough money for retirement. I wish I had figured out I wanted to be a children's librarian much sooner, so I would've had a chance to be one for at least a little while in the 'golden age'.

I know lots of you are struggling, too. If anyone has figured out how to escape some of the stress and still find some joy, to do a good job while maintaining healthier boundaries, to be able to let go and not let things drag them down, to stop taking things so personally and not lay awake every night thinking about everything that needs to be done or every little thing that went wrong, I'd love to hear from you! Additionally, how do you find the bandwidth to be there for your staff who are also struggling when you are barely hanging on by a thread yourself?

A Day In the Life of a Youth Services Manager

 

Last time I posted about a typical Monday, my planning and prep day; this day was a Tuesday, which is a programming day. Every Tuesday is Toddler Storytime in the morning (except during brief breaks in May, August, and December), and since it was the first Tuesday of the month we also had Pokémon Club in the afternoon. Today, once again my assistant was absent, which meant I had to cover the desk more as well as fill in for the Pokémon Club, which she usually does. So here's everything I did today, that I can remember:

A Day In the Life of a Youth Services Manager

 

I've been meaning to start doing this every since I got my first full-time, professional position, but for some reason kept forgetting. I thought it would be helpful for a few reasons: (1) so those considering a future as a children's librarian can see what they're getting into, (2) so other children's librarians can see they aren't the only ones juggling a million priorities, and (3) to remind myself that even on the days I may not feel I accomplished much, I am really doing a lot.

Has It Really Been Ten Years?

 

As of today, I have been working in public libraries for an entire decade! 

For the first seven years I held various part-time support and paraprofessional positions, but the last three years were as a full-time professional librarian. I started out as a page in the children's department, which is where I fell in love with working in public library youth services. Then I moved into an early literacy outreach specialist, which is where I really honed my storytime skills. After that I moved to a paraprofessional position in a very busy suburban branch. It was there I got to do other types of programming, collection work, and really developed my reader's advisory skills.

Then, just a few days shy of my 7th anniversary in that library system, and just weeks from finishing my MLIS degree, the pandemic hit and the library system let go ALL of its part-time staff, over 100 people. That jump-started my search for a full-time professional position, leading me to become the branch librarian/assistant manager of a small neighborhood library. It was here I learned how to adapt programming to rapidly changing conditions, doing virtual programming, take-home kits, and outdoor in-person programming. It was also here that I got a great deal of experience with more challenging customer service situations and found I was pretty good at de-escalation. Finally, I ended up in my current position as a youth services manager.

I can't believe it's already been 10 years! I have done hundreds of storytimes, dozens of other programs, made countless recommendations and suggestions, shelved thousands of books, and in my current position I have transformed a cold, sterile, unwelcoming children's department into a vibrant, welcoming environment and improved a very neglected collection. Along the way I have worked with a number of great children's librarians, and learned something from each of them. I have watched the field grow and change, seen trends come and go, and come back again, but I have seen the greatest and most rapid change in the last three years, and sadly, not for the better, which makes this anniversary very bittersweet.

New Year, New Job!

I have big news! I've started a new position, and this time I think it could be "the one".

Reflecting on 2020 and Looking at 2021

 

Every new year I like to reflect on the year that has passed, looking at everything I've experienced, accomplished and learned, and set goals for the year ahead. I was about to start this article off saying something like "Well, it's time for my usual new year's post...." when I realized that there was nothing "usual" about it this year. Before I write my annual post, I look at the one from the previous year to see how I did on meeting my goals, and as I read it I found myself thinking, "oh, you poor naïve thing, you have NO idea what is coming for you!" 2020 was a disaster of a year, bringing hardships, challenges, and changes that turned our world upside down, and will continue to have ramifications into 2021.

Change Is Not Easy - New Job, New Place, New Reality

 

The tree in Marty Kelley's Fall Is Not Easy was right; change is HARD! 

Like that tree, I've had to make a lot of big changes this fall, and it has not been easy. It has been, in a word, overwhelming! I've been at my new job for two weeks, and it has been a huge adjustment on many levels.

A New Beginning! Plus Job-Hunting Tips for New MLS Grads

I am very happy to say that beginning October 19th I will be employed once again, and as a full-time professional librarian! So hopefully I will have more meaningful content for the blog, and more time and energy to put into it, once I get settled.

It wasn't easy, and required a lot of compromise, sacrifice, and unconventional life choices, but it is a HUGE relief.

Research Publication

Finally, some good news for a change! I'm super excited to announce my research is going to be published!

You may (or may not) recall that I conducted a survey of child development knowledge among new children's librarians back in February of this year, distributed through this blog as well as the "Storytime Underground" and "Library Think Tank" Facebook groups, and some of you may have even participated in it. This survey was conducted as part of my MLIS Capstone project (basically, a mini-thesis project).

I made good use of the time off work because of the pandemic, expanding on the original research and doing some revisions and edits, and submitted the final manuscript for publication in May. This morning I was very pleased (and a little surprised) to get the notification that my manuscript had been accepted for publication, with no required revisions! I was prepared to have to do revisions, or even submit to 2 or 3 journals before getting accepted, so I am very proud, thrilled, and relieved to get it accepted by my first choice on the first try!

The purpose of this study was to assess the preparedness of new children’s librarians in the area of child development, by investigating the following research questions:

1. How much knowledge of child development do new children’s librarians have? 
2. How have new children’s librarians acquired knowledge of child development? 
3. Do new children’s librarians feel their level of child development knowledge is adequate? 
4. In what areas of children’s librarianship is having knowledge of child development helpful?

The title is "Child Development Knowledge Among New Children's Librarians in U.S. Public Libraries" and it will be published in the Journal of Education for Library and Information Science, Vol. 62, Issue 2 (April, 2021). 

*UPDATE - Frustratingly, my article got bumped and ended up being published 9 months later than I was originally told it would be, so it actually appears in JELIS Volume 63, Issue 1 (January, 2022).*

It is my hope that this research will contribute to more continuing education opportunities and a redesign of LIS youth services curricula to better reflect the knowledge and skills needed by today's children's librarians with a more significant and intentional inclusion of child development coursework, thus better preparing children's librarians to meet the needs of their patrons.

Once again, thanks to all those who participated!

Related posts:  "And The Survey Says..."     "Child Development Knowledge Survey"

Librarian In Limbo

I feel like that should be the title of my blog now, because that's exactly what I am and probably will be for some time, and it's left me feeling very disconnected and a bit discouraged and frustrated.

I finally completed my MLIS, so I guess I can legitimately call myself a librarian now, but I won't really feel like one until I have a job with the title as well. And thanks to the Covid-19 pandemic, the job market is at a complete standstill. Many libraries are still closed (as they should be), almost all are under a hiring freeze, and the lasting repercussions of the pandemic will make an already poor and extremely competitive job market even worse for some time to come. But, I really need a full-time job with benefits now! I really worry that I just wasted a lot of time, hard work, and money on a degree for nothing, and I know the more time passes and the older I get, the harder it's going to be to get a full-time librarian job.

On top of that, I'm not working at all right now. The system where I am employed as a part-time paraprofessional has been closed since March 14, and still doesn't have a date for re-opening. A few staff members have been called in starting this week to prepare for curbside service beginning June 8th, but as circ staff was prioritized, I was not among them. I am very fortunate and very grateful that we are all still being paid regardless, but at the same time I don't really feel quite right being paid for doing nothing, and I miss working. I miss the routine, I miss my coworkers, I miss interacting with patrons, I miss programming, I miss feeling productive.

Even though there is no expectation that I do any work while on paid emergency leave, I've tried to at least do some professional development. I've watched several webinars, I've expanded on my MLIS research project, did some editing and re-writes, and submitted it for publication; I've been reading as much middle-grade and YA as I can, I've recycled the slides from prior training presentations and recorded them with voiceover, and I will start working on making some flannel board sets since I haven't had time to do that in well over a year. 

But it just isn't the same. I love programming and sharing my programs though this blog, but haven't done a single program since February. I volunteered to do virtual programming, but was told I wasn't needed as the nine children's librarians in our system have that more than covered. Of course it makes sense, when doing virtual programming as a system you don't need to do nearly the number of programs as when doing in-person programs at multiple locations, so it requires far fewer staff to do it. My system has done a phenomenal job in handling this crisis and looking out for the best interests of both staff and the community; I have no complaints about any decisions they've made. It's just after nearly 3 months I now feel so disconnected from work and the whole professional community, and tired of being inside my own head so much of the time.

To make matters worse, even when I finally do get to go back to work, things won't be the same. I'm anticipating we won't be doing in-person programming for quite some time, and I really miss it. I expect that we won't have toys and things out, and won't be encouraging people to come and hang out for a while; people will be encouraged to just come in, get their materials and leave. We will be wearing masks, using "sneeze guards" and practicing social distancing, making interactions with patrons much more impersonal. While I know these extreme measures are necessary, it still makes me very sad that we will now have to do the opposite of what we've worked so hard to do in making libraries a vibrant, welcoming space. It seems like libraries are being set back 100 years, thanks to this pandemic. I know it's only temporary; I just hope it doesn't take us very long to get back to where we were before once it's over.

So instead of working and job-hunting, I'm stuck here in limbo, waiting. Waiting for this pandemic to pass, waiting to go back to work, waiting for a children's librarian job to open up, waiting for life to get back to some semblance of normal. 

The last four years I have been completely focused on getting my degree and doing everything I can to develop professionally to prepare for eventually applying for a professional position. Now that the degree is over and everything else has come to a standstill, I am left with this huge void. I supposed it's a good time to get back to some of my other interests or develop new ones outside of librarianship.... Or thoroughly clean and organize my house....But, let's not get too radical.

Anyone else out there stuck in limbo, too? Not working, not doing virtual programming, and/or job hunt put on hold? What are you doing to pass the time or feel productive?