wish we were there (again)

We took a lot of photos in Auckland, mostly inside libraries and certainly of many librarians. Check out the many readers advisory techniques used in Auckland’s libraries on our flickr collection.

And if you’re visiting Auckland, please drop in to the libraries and say hello from us. We miss those guys!

As well as meeting great librarians from the public libraries we also met the very inspirational Fiona Mackie, President of SLANZA (great article about her and Word Up in Collected #9, pages 16-17) and Catherine Frew from the Corporate Library. We caught up with the marvellous Tosca Waera (Social Media Coordinator, the personality behind @Auckland_Libs), Sally Pewhairangi from Finding Heroes (who inspires us with her big ideas) and Paul Brown – our amazing tour guide and readers advisory expert.

Here’s a link to a LIANZA 2012 paper by Richard Misilei, the awesome manager of  Tupu Youth Library – South Auckland Libraries: Connecting with Southside Youth. A library service to be proud of. If you’ve been there, shout about it!

We visited Central City, Botany, Tupu, Onehunga, Massey, Titirangi, Henderson, Takapuna and East Coast Bays libraries.

Everybody trundling

I find it very funny that both Australians and New Zealanders speak English, and yet there are words that I have no idea what they are talking about!! For example ‘trundlers’, the NZ equivalent to a shopping trolley!! Such a classic word 🙂

Today we visited three different libraries within the Auckland City Library service. First was Tupu youth library at Otara where we met Richie and his staff of children and teen librarians. Tupu is a purpose built library created to meet the needs of the youth in the community, and to provide safe spaces for young people. I really loved this space and idea, and was impressed with the staff and their vision for their service built on community and respect.

Next up was Botany Library where we met Karen and her staff. Botany library is located in a shopping centre and was built with retail principles in mind. Extended opening hours, purpose built equipment that promotes and displays collections and staff recruited to reflect retail principles of customer service and deliver a high end retail experience.

Last up was Onehunga Library, where we met Rachel and her team, and were reminded of why we do our job. Onehunga is located in what was traditionally an industrial, lower socio-economic area that is changing into a boutique community. Rachel believes attitudes make a big difference to the service you provide, and has staff greeting community members and spending time with them on the floor. We loved how she encouraged readers advisory using the young people in her library!

We also witnessed Phillipe – one of the children who use the library everyday – thank Rachel and her staff with flowers and a song for the time spent helping him this year. Alison and I were very moved, and it was a lovely reminder of the importance of libraries in local communities.

Last up, I saw this recruitment sign, and was very taken by it! What message does it send? Who is their intended audience? What type of people do you think would apply? What skills would they need? Made me wonder about recruiting librarians and what we would put on a poster such as this….

Study visit

As part of winning the QPLA scholarship, Alison and I have the privilege of visiting Auckland Library Service for a week long study visit. We get to spend time with a variety of librarians and staff from many different libraries that make up the service, and talk all things readers advisory/development.

I will try and post a couple of photos each night from our day.

We also spent the day with Karen Craig, Reader Services Coordinator from Auckland City Libraries. She graciously gave up her time to show us around the city branch, and talk about how physical spaces can enhance a readers advisory service (we will devote a new post to this!)

After giving up on finding any free wifi that actually connected us to the Internet, we meandered around Auckland CBD, looking like tourists and taking in the sights.