Why do we always want it our way?

Sian Brannon authored and article titled Donzens of Teens/Tweens in the Library at One Time? Why Not?. She details the experience of a new library and its daily saturation with large amounts of tweens and teens. She presents some interesting challenges in the article. The foremost is the flood of tweens into the library and the means the staff must take to keep them under control. She talks of failure after failure with various programs, due to the Hawthorne Effect mentioned by Lesesne (2006, p68), and notes that ultimately the most effective method for engaging and occupying the kids is, well... engaging them. Their staff members have an "ALL HANDS ON DECK"(p93) approach to getting to know the tweens involving getting out into their midst, engaging them, answering questions and policing. She ended the article talking about how the most effective thing they had done was get to now the students. She also mentioned that the only activities they offered which were consistently popular were access to the internet and a video games.

There is no mention in the article about them finding our what they should offer from the students themselves. She expresses frustration with how low the interest is in all the activities the library provides. It baffles me that programs weren't determined by feedback from the students themselves. Kids like games and the internet, which they luckily found, which is obvious. The challenge of being a successful library is cultivating interest in the truly priceless things the library can provide. One library in San Francisco is enthralling teens with computer software training(Whelen,p21). How is this library cultivating interest? What activities do the youth want? How can that be tied into libraries? How can they achieve buy-in from the youngsters? I don't have the answers, but I am confident that feedback from the youth is the first step in successfully pushing lifelong interest in reading.

Briannon, S. (2009). Dozens of Teens/Tweens in the Library at One Time? Why Not?. Texas Library Journal, 85(3), 92-93.

Lesesne, T. (2006). Naked Reading: Uncovering What Tweens Need to Become Lifelong Readers. Portland, Maine: Stenhouse Publishers.

Whelen, D. (2002). Chinatown Zine Lures Teens to Library. School Library Journal, 48(12), 21.