Kimball Library Strategic Plan

After a library tour with a critical eye and a very lively discussion, the staff focused on the following potential service responses:

The unusual thing about our end result is the focus on who will be in the active role, much more than on the services delivered.

Community members

• are information seekers
• are leisure readers
• are lifelong learners
• seek out diversity
• know their community

Library staff

• promote early literacy
• promote information fluency
• present diversity

The Library building is a comfortable and vibrant community space stewarded by the trustees.

The next step in the planning process is to get approval from the Board of Trustees on these priorities, and then to establish goals, objectives, and measures of our success.

After a long hiatus, we’re picking up the strategic planning process! You will recall that the process began in the spring, with a pair of meetings with select community members. They were asked to envision an ideal Randolph/Braintree, and then to discuss Kimball Library’s role in creating that ideal.

Please view the following pages in advance of our meeting on November 11th:

• “Meeting One: the data” – you will find links to Community demographics, Kimball Library statistics
• all of the pages from “Adults: vision and SWOT**” through”Miscellaneous potential services”

**Strengths – Weaknesses – Opportunities – Threats

And then take a peek at Library Service Responses. Keeping in mind what the planning committee identified as the most important roles for the Library in our community, and bringing your experience working here to bear, which service responses are the most important here? Why?

We will take a quick tour of the Library as though we’d never seen it before, spend some time discussing the committee’s comments, and settle on appropriate service responses. Then we will think about potential goals, objectives, and activities to pursue during the next 3-5 years. So please bring your most positive and ambitious attitude – and let’s have some fun!

Amy

Golly, it’s nearly impossible to get away from strategic planning! Within the past 24 hours, I caught two stories on public radio that relate to the discussion at our second meeting.

• Regarding measuring public school and student achievement, Steve Zind interviewed Jeanne Collins, superintendent of the Burlington School District, on VPR’s Vermont Edition.

VT schools falling short of No Child Left Behind goals

• Regarding the brave new world of e-content in libraries, here’s a story by Lynn Neary on NPR’s All Things Considered.

The future of libraries in the e-book age

And in response to publisher HarperCollins’ decision to limit their e-books to 26 checkouts, some libraries and consortia are opting not to purchase their content.

More libraries decide to give HarperCollins the cold shoulder

I hope that you will stay connected with the planning process as it continues. You’ll notice that I’ve posted the recorded results of our second meeting, nested under the vision and SWOT statements created at meeting one. I invite – nay, I heartily encourage! – all interested parties to comment on the potential services the committee identified, as well as letting the library staff and trustess know about the brilliant idea that occurred to you in the shower this morning.

With heartfelt gratitude for your time and effort,

Amy C. Grasmick, Director

Kimball Public Library

We have less than a week until our second strategic planning committee meeting, and I want to make sure that I both whet and satisfy your appetites.

First, some interesting reading about the world of libraries! As we will be using our second meeting to dream big about the Kimball Library of the Future, I include a link to an article in Library Journal about the best small public library in the United States.

Best Small Library in America 2011

These folks know how to make things happen in and for their community!

Next, a link to the Vermont Department of Libraries newsletter. If we worry about funding issues locally, take a look at the impact of federal funding on the state – and consider how that can reverberate to the local level. I mentioned at our first meeting that Vermont is one of eight states in the country that does not provide either state or county funding to public libraries. However, the Department of Libraries leverages federal monies for the well-being of all libraries in Vermont, including one of our basic daily operations: interlibrary loan.

VT Department of Libraries: Newsletter (3/11)

And to finish the whetting, a link to a story on NPR’s Morning Edition (3/28/11), about the development of digital picture books – or is that “books”?

Children’s Book Apps: A New World of Learning

This makes for compelling reading next to an article in the October 8, 2010 issue of the New York Times:

“Picture Books, Long a Staple, Lose out in the Rush to Read”

Given all of the change that libraries are facing, I’ll bet you can see why we consider your input into our strategic plan to be vital!

Now, on to feeding your appetites! I will go shopping later this week for comestibles and libations for our second meeting. Please let me know what you liked about the goodies provided last time – and what was definitely missing. (FYI: since this is taking place in a town-owned building, the event must be “dry”. Sorry.)

And please continue to comment on the other pages in this blog, including this one. Thanks!

Amy C. Grasmick

Director

Dear members of the strategic planning committee, library trustees and staff, and interested parties,

At the suggestion of Amy Howlett (VT Department of Libraries), I have created this blog in order to provide ongoing access to Kimball Library’s planning process, and to encourage ongoing participation from all interested parties.

For those of you who are new to blogs (or are new to blogs organized by librarians) you will see to the right of this post a series of hierarchical links. These links contain the meat of this blog’s content. For instance, under Meeting One: the recorded results, you find Meeting One: community vision and SWOT, and then a list of pages for the various segments of the community’s population. Each of these sub-pages includes the work we did at the first strategic planning meeting on March 19.

I hope that you will take this opportunity to look over the recorded results and community vision and SWOT, and then examine, think about, and comment on the flip chart pages. (If you find the images too small to read, you can click on them to get a larger view.) Your comments / replies will be incorporated into the foundation of the Library’s plan.

To leave a reply or comment, simply click on Comments and follow my example below. If I can do it, you can, too!

Amy C. Grasmick, Director

Kimball Public Library

amy@KimballLibrary.org