People to People Ambassadors

Visit to Indian Libraries and Cultural Sites

November 2 – 11, 2014

“When libraries open, democracy opens.”

               Dr. Nardiri Khatter, Deputy Librarian, University of Rajasthan

Between November 2 and 11, 2014, eight delegates from People to People Ambassadors visited the Golden Triangle in India:   New Delhi, Jaipur, and Agra.  This exciting trip included visits to the key cultural sites in the areas, visits to local libraries by the professional librarians, and an additional set of cultural sites for the librarians traveling companions.

The Delegates

Back row, left to right: Karen Watson, Pru Fallon, Betty Luscher, Joan Thompson, Nancy Bolt
From row, left to right: Robert Hubsher, James Morgan, Greg Thompson

Nancy Bolt

Nancy Bolt was State Librarian in Colorado for 18 years.   She left in 2005 to re-establish her library consulting business.  She is currently President of Nancy Bolt and Associates.  She specializes in strategic planning, program development and evaluation, the future of library services, and staff development.  She was Co-Project Director for the development and implementation of the American Library Association (ALA) Library Support Staff Certification (LSSC) Program.  Nancy has been active in international library work for 20 years.    She has been Chair of the ALA International Relations and currently she serves as Secretary of the IFLA Standing Committee on Library Services to People with Special Needs.

Betty Luscher

Betty Luscher has worked at the Corona Public Library in Corona, California since receiving her M.L.I.S. from San Jose State University in 1996. She was Technical Services Supervisor for 9 years before moving to her current position of Youth & Outreach Services Supervisor in 2012. Every month Betty recruits close to 50 teen & adult volunteers through an orientation and brief interviews. Through the Adult Reading Assistance Program, Betty pairs volunteers with functionally illiterate people who need to improve their reading skills.  In 2012 she received a grant to overhaul the library’s Spanish-language collection. She is a member of ALA and the International Relations Round Table of ALA.

Robert Hubsher  

Robert Hubsher is the Executive Director of the Ramapo Catskill Library System (RCLS), a cooperative public library system serving 47 libraries in four New York counties.  Passionate about intellectual freedom, privacy, and information fluency, he has recently been accepted as an Ambassador for Privacy by Design (PhD) an organization that addresses the effects of information technologies and large-scaled networked data systems.   As CEO and Chief Librarian of the Cornwall Public Library, ON, Canada, Robert managed the construction and renovation of the new library building and automated services. With his partner in PLAN22 Archibrarians, Karen Watson, he advises librarians during all the stages of their library building projects.

James Morgan

James E. Morgan is a retired librarian with thirty years’ experience in correctional libraries in Arizona, Nevada, and California.  His last position was at the California Youth Authority in Stockton, California.  He worked at the Arizona State Library as the Institutional Library Development Consultant where he developed a training program for Institutional Consultants in 11 western states.  James is a past chairman of the Library Services to Prisoners Section of the American Library Association and created five programs for prison librarians at ALA conferences. He also chaired the Membership Advisory Group on Library Service to the Developmentally Disabled, and was a past member of the Bibliotherapy Forum of ALA.

Prudence Fallon 

Prudence Fallon is the Adult Services and Reference Librarian for Tiverton Library Services in Tiverton, Rhode Island.  Her duties include adult collection development, programming and reference work for the Essex Public Library and coordinating community service workers and volunteers, book clubs, proctoring, updating the website, computer trouble-shooting and more.   She is currently working to facilitate a move to a brand new, larger library in the spring.  She works with Ocean State Libraries where she is lead purchaser of e-books for the state and on the Digitization and Adult Services Committee and Reference Working Group.  Prudence previously worked in the corporate field for 25 years in Communications, Marketing, Procurement, Research & Development and Consumer Affairs for Ocean Spray Cranberries.

Greg Thompson 

Greg Thompson works at the Carmel Mountain Library, a Branch of the San Diego Public Library in San Diego, California.   He works as a Library Aide at the library where he helps maintain the library collection and helps library use find the materials they want.  He is currently working on his Master’s in Library Science.

Karen Watson

Karen Watson is an Architect. She is particularly interested in coaching librarians to effectively communicate their libraries’ needs to architects. With 35 years’ experience in construction, specification writing, strategic planning, construction safety, interior fit up and residential, commercial and institutional building design, she wants to contribute to the success of the next generation of librarians as they build the future of libraries.  She and her partner Robert Hubsher are authors of “Making the Case for Your Library Building Project – Library Development Guide #5″, for the Southern Ontario Library Service (SOLS). She developed and presents webinars to the SOLS Advanced Public Library Leadership (APLL) Institute.

Joan Thompson

Joan is a counselor and coordinates programs for low income community college students at San Diego Miramar College. She has served at Miramar for 35 years. Her interest in libraries stems from childhood where weekly trips to the local library were a special time. As an educator, she values reading and learning as a way out of poverty.

NOTES FROM THE PROFESSIONAL VISITS

As part of our visit, the professional delegates participated in two conferences and visited three libraries.  The conferences were held at the National Institute of Science, Technology, and Development Studies (NISTADS) and DELNET.

NISTADS

Our first professional day began with a visit to NISTADS, an organization devoted to studying various aspects of the interaction among science, society, and the state.   The NISTADS sponsored conference, Library Information Systems and Services:  Challenges and Opportunities, had nine speakers in about 3 hours.   In introducing the conference, Dr. P. Banerjee raised issues faced by Indian libraries:  increasing digitizataion; the multitude of languages spoken in India; low-level literacy, particularly in rural areas; and lack of local library use.

Three of our delegates made presentations.   Team leader Nancy Bolt discussed Predicting the Future:   Eight Emerging Trends in Library Service:  the changing role of libraries; the format expansion of library collections; the need to support community economic development; the library as an educational center for all ages; continually arriving new techbnology; the need for new library staff skills; the library as a community hub; and the need to recruit people to advocate for library service.

Nancy Bolt

Nancy Bolt

Betty Luscher

Betty Luscher

Robert Hubsher

Robert Hubsher

Delegate Robert Hubsher spoke on Intellectual Freedom and Privacy in Libraries:  Challenges in the Ditigal Age.   He began his presentation by acknowledging the impact that Indian philosopher and librarian, Dr. S. R. Ranganthan, had on his career and on the development of Indian public libraries.  He discusses this in more depth his the attached narrative.

Hubster went on to define intellectual freedom, privacy, and confidentialty.  Hubsher praised the role of libraries in protecting these three principles on behalf of their users and  asked who controlls the data collected by vendors in integrated library systems (ILS) that is stored in a digital cloud?   The issue of privacy and confidentiality is particularly sensitive in the arena of social media.   After his presentation, one Indian attendee described Robert as courageous in his defense of these principles.

Betty Luscher, discussed the history of the Corona Public Library in Corona, California and what it faces in the future in Profile of a U.S. Public Library:  Its History, Challenge, and Successes.  Betty described how the community has grown and the struggles of the library to keep up.  From 1993 to today, Corona’s population has increased over 5 times.  Staffing rose along with economic & population growth, but now is back to the same level as in 1990, at 40 employees.   Meanwhile the book budget had dropped from $97,000 to $71,282.   Despite this the library has purchased books, online resources, and audio-visual materials  thanks to fees, donations, fund-raising events and grants.  The library has both a Friends group and a Foundation that raise funds to support the library.  Betty described the multi-source funding of the library and the popular services it offers.  The library will be changing again because of a recent merger with the city’s  Recreation Department.

For the Indian conference contributers, there were several highlights.   Mr. H. R. Meena described the services of the New Delhi Public Library (NDPL) which were remarkably similar to the services of large public libraries in the US.   A disappointment of the trip was that our schedule did not permit a trip to this library, particulalry after we heard Mr. Meena’s description. Through it’s 24 braches and 25 deposit collections,  NDPL provides free public library service to the residents of New Delhi including print and AV materials; digitization of rare books, reference, children’s programs, 120 computers (less than would be in a US public library of this size), book mobiles for rural areas, and services to the incarcerated in prisons.  They also offer an impressive array of cultural programs such as dance and music programs, creative writing, film, and exhibitions as well as training of library staff.  As is true in US libraries, usage is up but budget cuts reduce the number of staff.

Professor B K Sen from the India National Science Academy discussed the explosion of research and the difficult of getting access to this information by researches, estimating that Indian libraries only have access to 2% of the research available.   Subscription costs to databases, even those that include papers done by Indian researchers, prohibit easy access.    Mr. G. Mahesh from the National Knowledge Research Center echoed  the issues of increasing cost and stagnating budgets and the lack of access to current research.

Dr. Anup Das from Jawaharlal Nehru University discussed “Open Access to Scholarly Research:   Implications for Research Libraries.”   His presentation was really a list of helpful hints to be recognized as a scholarly researcher such as:  create a unique personal ID; create your own website to share your research; participate in academic social networking; share your published work in Open Access Repositories; and create a profile in Google Scholar Citations and track when and where you are cited.

In the Q&A that followed the presentations the discussion focused on the difficulty of accessing information and data because of the hardware migration, the disappearance of digital documents, the lack of preservation and that “India contributes to intellectual content but can’t afford to subscribe to the databases that have this content.”   Dr. Bannerjee also commented that the projected growth of technology is fast but that Indian government bureaucracy is not always able to make decisions quickly.  The US delegates quickly concurred.

DELNET

DELNET, created in 1988, is the Indian Developing Network, so named because it strives to be continuously developing its services for its users.   Dr. Sangetta Kaul, DELNET’s Deputy Director, made a presentation about the services of DELNET followed by a conference similar to the one at NISTADS.   At this conference, all the U S delegates were surprised to learn that we were expected to give our presentations again, only a shortened version, which we really didn’t have time to shorten.  However, we did our best.

DELNET serves as the interlibrary loan hub for Indian libraries.   It currently has 20 million records from 4700 member libraries (including some in the United States) and a 95% fill rate for requests.   Most of the member libraries are academic libraries.  Membership costs $150 and the only transaction fee is the postal charges.  They work in 21 languages and use Koha as their ILS, providing support for local libraries that also use Koha.  They consider DELNET to be “the most effective library sharing network in South Asia” with a “common goal to provide information to the public.”

In addition to ILL using a union catalog of books, DELNET also subscribes to e-books, DVDs, and full text databases with a goal of providing the requested resources within three days maximum waiting time.  They do limited reference work and provide training to their members.

Dr. H. K.Kaul, Director of DELNET, opened the conference on “The Future of Librarianship” by commenting that information growth is phenomenal particularly in the digital arena.   Libraries are no longer the depository of all documents.  Publishers are not selling content, they are leasing it.   The growth of MOOCs is decreasing the use of libraries as students get information online from content providers who want to bypass libraries and deliver information to users directly.  Online education is transforming education; what is the role of libraries? Administrators ask why have a library if students can get the information directly.  Library education needs to respond by helping libraries to be subject specialists and to determine what students really need.

Professor P. B. Mangla, the Tagore National Fellow from the Indian Ministry of Culture, discussed the history of public libraries in India.   Robert Hubsher describes Dr. Mangla’s presentation in his attached narrative.

Dr. Gayas Makhdumi, University Librarian at Jamia Millia Islamia, suggested that librarians involve “the taxpayer” in planning library services and ask users what they want from libraries.  He advocated for the Indian Minister of Education to establish a national e-library with free and open access to every student and that library collaboration with students and teachers is “essential.”  Dr. Makhdumi asked how libraries can transform themselves to be more useful to their users.   “Good customer service can produce advocates” and libraries should work toward this goal.

Indian Institute of Health Management Research

Dr. Marthur, Associate Professor and Library Director, described the history of IIHMR, which started as a research institute in 1984.   The institute specializes in training managers and researchers in health services.  IIHMR offers a two-year diploma in hospital and health management.  They have recently  begun a program in pharmaceutical management as well.   They also work with the World Health Organization to do training and have a cooperative agreement with Johns Hopkins University to offer a joint degree in health management.  70% of the placement of their graduates is in rural areas.  Dr. Marthur indicated that getting rural residents to use government health programs is a challenge.  Many  prefer to try to “self-heal” or go to use local “medical quacks” until they are very sick and then go to a “real” doctor.   One goal of IIHMR is to work with local community and women’s groups to do village education and teach health and hygiene.  He did not feel that rural public libraries were used enough to be useful in this effort.   As in other Indian services, the multitude of languages is a challenge.   He commented “go three kilometers in India and the water and language changes.”

IIHMR graduates go into three areas after graduation:

• Hard core research and evaluation of health management programs
• Implementing a program, project management
• Study for their PhD and publish

The library that supports IIHMR is a member of DELNET and has 28,000 books, journals, textbooks, case studies, newsletters, conference proceedings, and reports from all over the world.  The library receives over 130 nnational and international professional and research journals.

Nancy Bolt with librarians at DELNET

University of Rajasthan

Nancy Bolt with librarians at DELNET

At the University of Rajasthan we met with Professor N. D. Marthur, Director of the central library and Dr. Nardiri Khatter, Deputy Librarian.  Dr. Khatter began with her own  list of the four major problems facing Indian academic libraries:   reduced funding, declining use, lack of modernization, and keeping up with digital collections.   The library has open staff positions without the permission from the university administration to fill them.  “The library is starving for funding,”  Dr. Khatter said.

Still the library does its best to meet the needs of the students.    Officially the library is open from 9am to 9pm, however, the students wanted longer hours so the library is now open 24 hours, without formal permission to do so.   The library has an advisory council made up of faculty members who make recommendations to the university administration about purchases and new library services.  The library has 500,000 items including books, journals, government documents, maps, braille,  microform, and a rare collection from Mount Abu, the home of British envoys during the British domination.   It also has a fine arts collection representing the different cultures of India.  Its annual circulation is 24,126; the annual budget $26,315; a staff of 35; and 10 computers for students.   In our tour of the library we saw the small computer room which had multiple students around each computer.

Still, Dr. Khatter related their hopeful plans for the future:  strengthen the infrastructure, add RFID, renovate the building, add more e-books, add more computers, and hire more trained staff.

 Computer room at the university

Computer room at the university

Public Library of Jaipur

The Jaipur Public Library was an unusual facility.   We were ushered into the Community Meeting room to meet with the library director, Mr. Saharan.   This meeting room was large, clean, and bright, with microphones and soft executive chairs.  The library rents out this room for the use of local government and businesses.  The library itself is very different with dusty shelves and books.   The library seems to serve primarily as a study location for young people studying to improve their opportunities in life.  The library rents out study rooms so researchers or students can reserve a spot to store their research and study materials.  A large study room was filled with young people – segregated with the young men on one side of a wall and the young women on the other.  Mr. Saharan said the library has 95,000 books and 3000 “members.”

A national India Foundation, Raja Rammohun Roy, provides TV equipment, donated books, and furniture. The books did not seem relevant to rural India and were not processed or shelved to be available for the public.

Public Library

Commonalities between US and India Libraries

By Nancy Bolt

While in India, the People to People delegation met with many Indian librarians and heard several presentations about Indian libraries.   The US delegates also share information about the current status of US libraries.   We were able to determine many similarities about the issues faced by libraries in both countries.   This provides a foundation for continued possible cooperation between Indian and US libraries.

Commonalities

1. Many libraries in both countries are dealing with “increasing costs and stagnating budgets” that result in staff cuts as described by Mr. Mahesh, Principle Scientist and Coordinator at CSIR-NKRC.
2. All speakers discussed the expediential growth of technology and the difficulty that libraries have in keeping current.   More and more documents are digitized and libraries must find ways to access what is available. In addition, as hardware changes, content and data is lost if it cannot migrate to a new platform.
3. Speakers discussed the movement from owning content to leasing online content. The India speakers mentioned creating content that appears in databases they do not have the resources to subscribe to. In addition, in leased content, if a library ceases to subscribe, all the previously available content is no longer accessible to users.
4. All libraries were concerned about maintaining their relevance today’s world as people seek information on their own; publishers reach out to buyers individually bypassing libraries; and the difficulty of accessing all the digitization now published.
5. In order to provide quality service, the libraries in both countries participate in networks like DELNET and cooperative networks in the United States such as Ramapo Catskill Library System.
6. Advocacy for the role and relevance of libraries is crucial. NGOs, other community partners, and uses can advocate for the value of library services and need to be encouraged to advocate for the library.   Libraries can promote advocacy by asking library users and local NGOs what services they would like and attempting to deliver them.
7. A multitude of languages in both countries provide challenges for libraries to serve the library user.   The problem includes availability of materials in multiple languages and the ability of staff to communicate with users.   In India, this is particularly a problem in rural areas. In the US, it is more a problem in urban areas where immigrants settle.
8. Public library services in the New Delhi Public Library seem very similar to modern public library services in the US with the major difference that US libraries are able to provide more computers for public use. Libraries in both countries struggle with sufficient bandwidth.   Libraries in both countries also are offering more cultural and outreach activities, becoming a “place” for people in communities to congregate and receive services beyond traditional books.
9. Education is changing radically with more and more online education in both countries.   MOOCs are popular in urban India as well as the US.   The role of libraries in serving students in such dispersed areas is unclear.   Libraries need to find a way to provide library services in the far-flung educational environment.
10. Bureaucracy in both countries can sometimes be a barrier to library development and the initiation of new services that users request.
11. Library staff must acquire new skills to respond to new demands and challenges. Library education must respond to this need with new curricula.

Dr. Gayas Makhdumi, University Librarian at Delhi University Library summed up the challenge when he said:   “Libraries have to change, can they?”

Impressions of Indian Libraries

By James Morgan

1. Libraries in India are very strong proponents of advocacy. They use every opportunity they can find to let the public know they are out there, and they try to compete for the public’s attention.
2. South Africa and India have a problem with multiple languages in their respective countries. There are approximately seven different languages spoken in South Africa. But in India there are at least 1,700 different languages spoken. This presents a problem for libraries that try to collect literature from all over the country.
3. We saw a wide cross section of libraries on our trip. The public library in Jaipur and the Rajasthan University library were housed in old buildings that were completely inadequate. The buildings were a barrier to the provision of quality of good service. The difference between them is that the University library wanted to build a new facility and the public library seemed to not care about the condition of their building.
4.  Indian libraries are concerned about funding, just like libraries in the United States are. Support for library service at the national level is fragmented. There is no national library grant program in India like there has been in the United States.

Shared by James LaRue – CEO, LaRue & Associates

http://jaslarue.blogspot.com/2014/10/bulgaria-10-years-later.html

My first trip, a State Department grant, happened back in 1994. Nancy Bolt, then State Librarian of Colorado, teamed up with a former legislator in Iowa to arrange for a series of workshops and travel exchanges. Back then, Bulgaria was still throwing off the Soviet influence. Libraries had been tools of the state: a mechanism for the distribution of propaganda. Perhaps as a consequence, they did not enjoy a lot of public use or support.

There was also a parallel institution: the chistalistes. Think “culture center” – a place to celebrate the folk programs and activities of a country very rich in history.

The purpose of that first visit was to present a model of library as community information center. We talked about helping libraries begin to consciously collect and promote their collections to distinct market segments. We tried to encourage our colleagues to become not just passive distributors of state literature, but active, engaged, and visible “players.”

But I don’t want to suggest that our sole purpose was just to tell them to be more like us. We learned a lot from them, too, and found that librarians everywhere are united by more similarities than differences: we are motivated by the desire to serve, we love and promote reading, we work to make our communities better.

I spent time in Sofia, the capital, and then took a lovely bus ride through the Balkans to Dobrich, where I shadowed the very astute and forward-thinking director of the library, Elena (who has now moved on to the leadership of an academic library) for a time.

The Bulgarians were then scrambling to join the European Union. They impressed me. Again, their history goes back past the Romans (although Roman ruins still endure there) to pre-history. I reveled in walking through their cobblestone streets, along rivers, past countless small shops. Their food is amazing.

I’m ashamed to say that over the years, I haven’t stayed in as much contact with my colleagues there as I should have. All of us were busy.

But then I was invited back by the Bulgarian Library and Information Association to present a two day workshop on “community reference” — which I pioneered with my former staff at Douglas County Libraries, and which they have written and spoken about across the country. (See my previous blog for more about “community reference.”)

Bulgaria has changed. It seems far less Soviet and far more European than 10 years ago. A lot more people – young people in particular – speak English. Due to a favorable rate of exchange, it’s very affordable. Sofia is still a wonderfully engaging and walkable city. The food is still great, the people are consistently gracious and interesting. Wifi is everywhere. There are a lot of shops, restaurants, hotels, and parks.

Bulgaria has problems, though, too. First is a subtle demographic: a lot of young people abandoned Bulgaria for points west, in quest of both learning and wealth. That leaves behind some older folks who have begun to wax nostalgic about the unlimited medical care of the old Soviet era. Second is the problem of corruption: I gather it’s fairly widespread, with ties to organized crime. Third is a kind of cynicism: after the Soviet collapse and the embrace of capitalism, people thought their lives would immediately begin to resemble those portrayed on American movies and TV. There is some sense of disappointment, even betrayal.

I talked with a lot of people in my week there. While not everyone agreed with this, one woman said she saw strong evidence of rising anti-American and pro-Russian sentiment. (Bulgaria is, by the way, just about half way between the Ukraine and Israel.) But this is what struck me: there are three ways, she said, that the US and Russia are the same. She said,

1. You both think you’re exceptional.
2. Neither one of you knows or cares much about the rest of the world.
3. Both of you feel free to invade any country you like, whenever you feel like it.

On the one hand, that’s an awkward pairing. On the other, I see how she got there.

After the workshops, funded by the America for Bulgaria Foundation, I thought about the problems some of the directors had shared with me. Bulgarian libraries are seen as “the memory of the people.” That’s fine as far as it goes, and although no politicians would close a library, they don’t invest in its success, either. So with very little funding (a fraction of what goes to even the poorest American libraries), it’s hard to attract new patrons. They can’t buy much in the way of collections, and there are no – not one – purpose-built public libraries in the nation. Instead, they are scattered across former Community Party buildings and other re-purposed structures, broken into a series of small rooms with too many poorly paid workers and too few resources of any kind.

While there, I was also interviewed by someone who works with a lot of children’s publishers. There is widespread illiteracy in Bulgaria – a problem that may be getting worse. (This despite some very well-educated people, too, and lots of outdoor booksellers!)

Upon reflection, I wrote to my key contact in Bulgaria, the wise, vivacious, and extraordinarily dedicated Anna Popova, that although I enjoyed giving the workshop, I do not believe even widespread adoption of that strategy would really address the underlying lack of support of Bulgarian libraries. Instead, I recommended that they adopt something that I have come to believe, more and more, is the foundation of American librarianship: major outreach to children.

If you are not a library user, it takes a life transition to make you one. One of the most powerful transitions is parenthood. In the US, a third to half of our public library business revolves around children’s materials. We provide free storytimes, then send families home laden with books. Study after study affirms the vital importance of a rich exposure to language to the brains of infants. As I’ve noted elsewhere, if a child between the ages of 0-5 can get 500 books in their home, it’s as good as having two parents with Master’s degrees, regardless of the actual education or income of their parents. This, in turn, affects everything from childhood health to earning potential and productivity. It’s a modest investment that pays huge societal dividends.

Moreover, children’s services is the most powerful recruitment strategy for libraries we have. It not only solves real and important social problems, it also establishes an emotional connection with the next generation. It is is essential to our survival.

While many Bulgarian libraries offer some services to children, there is nothing like the widespread all-out recruitment of the US.

Can Bulgaria make that shift?

I don’t know. Culture and history are powerful things. But I concluded this time, as I did the last time I visited, that Bulgarian librarians are up to the challenge. And they represent a significant asset to their nation.

Submitted by Jon Walker, Executive Director, Pueblo City-County Library District

Panimachivac School Girls

PCCLD currently is taking final steps constructing three new libraries in underserved areas of our county.  As we count down the days until these new libraries open to the public, I recently had a unique opportunity to see this effort in a different light.

In July, I worked onsite in a remote village in Guatemala with a group helping build a new community library.  I learned many things there, including what we take for granted here in our community can be a luxury somewhere else.

Guatemala is located in a historically rich region, where the indigenous Maya civilization dates back more than two-thousand years with a written language, beautiful works of art, sophisticated practices in mathematics and astronomy, advanced architectural and construction techniques and more.  Today, however, Guatemala is a poor country where individual families possess only about five percent of the earning power compared with the typical household in the USA.  The people of Guatemala were long subjugated by the Spanish and more recently the area was torn by civil war for nearly forty years from 1960 until the late 1990s.  The country’s economy today principally is tied to agriculture and textiles, but it lacks some basic modern infrastructure such as reliable electricity, available machinery and potable water.  When peace finally came to Guatemala, many citizens for the first time were guaranteed certain basic rights that we accept as a given in the USA, such as access to public education that only recently has become available to most citizens there through sixth grade.

Today, with peace in their nation, there are significant efforts underway to modernize Guatemala.  This includes work to establish schools and libraries.  My recent time there—along with members of the Pueblo Rotary Club and others—was part of a much bigger effort to provide the citizens of the area with improved access to education, information and literacy.

We worked mainly on preliminary construction of a library in Panimachivac, a community located in the distant highlands of the country, but we also visited the site of a recently completed community library that was a year in the making in the village of La Loma.  Almost all work there is done by hand with very little machinery and only basic tools.  Our USA team worked on the library during the day, and we were joined by villagers in the late afternoon as they returned from their daily toil in neighboring agricultural fields.  Our effort was coordinated by PAVA, an in-country non-profit organization dedicated to helping the people of Guatemala.

I could not help but compare my daily life in Pueblo with the locals I worked alongside in Panimachivac and met in La Loma.  Many of the things that we accept as given here are luxuries there, such as indoor plumbing, motorized transportation, professional healthcare, and so on.

Even our relatively modest contribution to enable greater access to information and literacy is important.  One story can help illustrate this.  Only the younger generation there commonly enjoys access to education.  This means older people are often illiterate.  So, it is meaningful now when a young girl in the village of La Loma can take out a book from the new library there on a topic like astronomy.  She had learned to read in school and took the book home to read to her father, who is illiterate.  He told her that although he had seen the stars, moon and sun, he never knew until that moment beyond what he saw in the sky.

My visit to Guatemala provided me with a fresh view of the rich life and opportunities afforded us here in the USA, which are what dreams are made of in places like Panimachivac and La Loma.  It reinforced for me the universal value of free and open access to information, the joy of reading, and the importance of libraries, not only here in Pueblo but also around the world.

Working on the new library retaining wall (Panimachivac, Guatemala)

Preparing lunch (Panimachivac, Guatemala)

Celebrating opening of new library (La Loma, Guatemala)

Date: August 13, 2014

Time: 10:00-11:30 am

Location: Tracy Learning Center, Regis University Library – 3333 Regis Blvd, Denver, CO 80221

Meeting Agenda 8-13-14

Come celebrate with us from 3-5pm on August 11th at Denver’s Central Library for the opening reception of Norihito Yoshimoto’s Kiri-e exhibit in partnership with Denver’s sister city of Takayama!

Click on the link below to read Greg Glasgow’s great article about DU alumni, Rebecca Stephens and Eric Bemiller, who built a library from scratch in the Pacific island nation of Tonga.

http://magazine.du.edu/alumni/morgridge-alums-help-build-first-public-library-in-tonga/​

“I’m going to Tonga. You in?” This is how I was invited on my first international library adventure. Eric Bemiller had been telling me about a Tongan library project for a few weeks, but he was not sure he would be able to go to Tonga. His text came Thursday, June 27, 2013. I said yes June 29, and we were flying to Tonga on Sunday, July 21. In those three weeks we would learn the genesis of the Northern Lights Library and write our goals for the mission, in the month following we accomplished those goals and laid the librarianship foundation for the first public library in the Kingdom of Tonga, and in the year since we have continued to support Kato Havea, a Tongan native and the heart and founder of Northern Lights Library, in her efforts.

Tonga and Samoa were devastated by a tsunami in September 2009 while Kato was living in Alaska. After five anxious days, she finally connected with a young cousin in Ha’apai, Tonga who assured her the whole family was safe despite losing their home and all of their possessions. Then that eleven year old boy, whose connection to his far off cousin was the bookshelf she kept stocked, asked a question that would change Kato’s life. He said, “Our books are gone. Can you send more books?” That afternoon Kato picked up four children’s books and returned to her office. Staring at those books she decided she would not just replace her cousin’s library, she would build a library for all of the children of Tonga. Books had opened the world to her and she wanted to “Provid[e] the children of Tonga an opportunity to explore the world through books.” (Northern Lights Library vision statement)

Spring 2013 was time to ship the donations, approximately 50,000 books and serials, from Alaska to Tonga. Through Operation Handclasp, a United States Navy Pacific partnership, Kato was able to send the books to Tonga on a navy vessel. Other organizations and NGOs were part of Operation Handclasp including Project HOPE, a medical NGO. When the ship arrived in Tonga, Project Hope’s Dr. Lynn Bemiller volunteered to assist with the Northern Lights Library project in her spare time. She asked her son, Eric, for direction in sorting the books, and, when she learned there was no librarian to continue the project, she offered to ask Eric to travel to Tonga to help. The community would host Eric and me, and we would go as Project HOPE volunteers so as to travel under an established nonprofit.

Preparation for the trip included conversations with Kato to understand her and the community’s vision as well as conversations with Janet Lee who helped us focus our goals and set realistic expectations. We arrived at the Princess Kaimana Northern Lights Library in Havelu, Tonga with three goals for our month: weed, organize, and classify the donated books; figure out day-to-day library operations; and organize a library committee. Two weeks after walking into the library we had touched every item in the library, weeded 10-15% of the items, and organized every book by type – children’s, adult fiction, adult nonfiction, reference, and textbooks. Three days before we flew home we had classified every book using a borrowed print Dewey from 1972. Interviews with community leaders and the chosen librarian helped me write collection development and library management policies for the Princess Kaimana Library. We designed library shelving and the layout for the library and trained and encouraged the librarians in basic librarianship. Our final goal was modified when we realized that the concept of committees was too western. We changed our focus to ensuring that the library had stakeholders by reaching out to the community and finding interested parties. Throughout the month we worked closely with Lady Tuna and Vika, two community leaders and members of the local government. We met parents and community members who wanted the library and saw its value to the community. Finally, we met a retired school librarian volunteering in the local high school who was willing to introduce the librarians to the school librarian community and assist with the Princess Kaimana Library. In 19 working days we accomplished every goal and laid the framework for the Northern Lights Libraries in Tonga.

Libraries are so deeply engrained in American and western culture they can be taken for granted, so for me being in Havelu for a month was inspiring. The people of Tonga have libraries, but only small collections in their schools. A public library will allow children more access to reading material, laborers access to philosophy, and the community to medical and health care materials. A year after we committed to this project Eric and I had the opportunity to present at ALA and draw more attention to Northern Lights Library. We are continuing to support Kato in her efforts as she works to establish Northern Lights Library as a nonprofit so she can complete her first two libraries, Princess Kaimana and a yet to be named library in Ha’apai near her cousin, the inspiration for this whole project.

Poudre River Public Library District is pleased to announce that earlier this year we entered into a collaborative agreement as Sister Library to the San Juan del Sur Biblioteca, located in San Juan Del Sur, on Nicaragua’s Pacific coast.

The San Juan del Sur (SJDS) Biblioteca was established in 2000 by a Colorado native, Jane Mirandette, in cooperation with local residents. The SJDS Biblioteca was the first public lending library in the country of Nicaragua. Since its inception, the library has provided services to the residents of San Juan del Sur as well as mobile library services to remote and rural towns and villages in the surrounding region.

The SJDS library recently acquired a new, larger space. The new, 2,000 square foot library opened in May. Its expanded collections, new computers and dedicated staff are offering improved access and learning opportunities in a country where most citizens have never experienced the tremendous benefits offered by a public lending library. As Ms. Mirandette said recently, the SJDS Biblioteca is helping to create a reading culture where none existed before.

The SJDS Biblioteca, the Hester J. Hodgdon Libraries for All Program which supports the SJDS library, and Ms. Jane Mirandette are known and respected internationally and in the US library and educational communities. In 2009, the Hester J. Hodgdon Libraries for All Program was the recipient of the ALA Presidential Citation for International Innovation. The SJDS Biblioteca is also an active member of the Nicaraguan Library Association ANIBIPA and a founding member of their En Tu Biblioteca campaign with ALA and IFLA.

As we considered a cooperative relationship, both parties saw that Sister Library programs offer substantial benefits. They allow for the sharing of information, resources, training and expertise among the staff and patrons from both libraries, promote the concept of a global community of libraries, and raise awareness of issues and needs facing libraries internationally. The American Library Association recognizes the value of Sister Libraries and promotes the establishment of such partnerships through its International Relations Round Table. This partnership is also recognized by the newly formed International Library and Cultural Exchange Interest Group (ILCE-IG)of the Colorado Association of Libraries, with hopes that the two Sister Libraries will serve as an example and resource for other libraries contemplating similar cooperative relationships.

Our agreement is already producing exciting results. PRPLD staff members Carol Gyger and Victor Zuniga helped the SJDS Biblioteca select, customize, and implement Koha library open source software, to establish an automated circulation system and catalog. Victor Zuniga trained the Nicaraguan staff to use and support the software. Johanna Ulloa, PRPLD Outreach Specialist, and SJDS Biblioteca staff have brought together students from San Juan del Sur and a Ft Collins bilingual school (Harris Bilingual Elementary in the Poudre School Distrct) to participate in Skype, traditional pen pal and e-mail pal projects. Over 30 students from both countries have sent letters and drawings of themselves back and forth, with plans to continue the connections between the groups when school begins again in the fall for the Ft Collins students.

We are hopeful that these efforts are just the beginning, and that moving forward we will forge a collegial and productive relationship between our two libraries. Pictured here is Holly Carroll, Executive Director, Poudre River Public Library District and
Jane Mirandette, Founder/Director San Juan del Sur Biblioteca.

www.sjdsbiblioteca.org
www.librariesforall.org
SJDS Biblioteca catalog(English & Spanish):
http://catalogo.sjdsbiblioteca.org/

Article submitted by Ken Draves, Deputy Director, Poudre River Public Library District

The ILCE-IG is pleased to announce that our proposal for the CAL conference has been selected. “It’s a Small, Small World: Helping Libraries around the World” is slated for Friday, October 17, 3:00-4:15 p.m. (subject to change).

Members of the CAL International Library Cultural Exchange-Interest Group are active around the world helping libraries.  Come and hear stories of our work. Kathy Plath works with libraries and schools in Lesotho bringing inexpensive durable computers to students and teachers with the One Laptop per Child Project.  Jane Mirandette and architect Justin Martinez collaborated to design and build the new San Juan del Sur Biblioteca using crowd source fundraising.  Nancy Bolt delivered a check from ALA to aid earthquake destroyed libraries in the Philippines and will describe the damage, the efforts to recover, and overall library service.  Janet Lee, Chair of ILCE-IG, will moderate.

Last year our International reception was quite a success.  Watch for announcements of a time and place for this very fun event. 

Join us for our next ILCE-IG meeting!

Date: Wednesday, June 11th

Time: 10-11:30 a.m.

Location: Regis University, Tracy Learning Center – 3333 Regis Blvd., Denver CO 80221

Meeting Agenda