Next Library 2019 in Aarhus, Denmark was just as engaging and enjoyable as the first time I attended in 2017. In fact, it has become one of my favorite learning opportunities, informing my teaching and research. A conference that demands active participation, requires outside the box thinking, and reserves “the right to alterations and surprises” is an enjoyable challenge.
This time, it was even more so. Next Library accepted my proposal for a session on narrative inquiry, but “with a little twist.” I had been matched with three other people and charged with creating a single cohesive interactive session from the combined proposals!
MEET THE PLAYERS
Via email, I was introduced to Kylie Carlson, coordinator of community learning and partnerships at Yarra Libraries in Australia; Felicity Macchion, library manager at Yarra Libraries; and Jason Evans Groth, digital media librarian at North Carolina State University Libraries. We had to find the synergies between all three of our abstracts and, in the words of Tim Gunn, make it work! The experience was exactly what Next Library is all about: getting people together to learn and think in unexpected ways. Carlson echoed this sentiment in a follow up chat with me: “We found this approach was very reflective of the NEXT organisers’ strong commitment to collaboration, creativity, and the power of seeing what could unfold with a unique approach towards conference presentations.”
Here’s what I learned: This type of experience was transformative for us, and perhaps we should seek more ways to collaborate with our global colleagues in the field. Macchion agreed: “What we really enjoyed was that we all came from different library worlds—academic, public, university—yet our united message really shone through: involved librarianship that creates impactful conversations, services, and programs.”
HERE’S THE STORY
Our abstracts were all about storytelling in its many forms. The common threads between them were using everyone’s voice to tell our stories and how to use stories to promote and make our libraries accessible and useful. What came out on the other side of several Zoom meetings, multiple email threads, various iterations of a set of slides, and a lot of thought and reflection, was an interactive session that ticked all the boxes of what an engaging and challenging workshop should be. Every step of the way, our audience members shared their own stories, from memories of summer days as children to personal stories about challenges we may all face in LIS.
I opened the session with an overview of the power of stories and a quick dive into narrative inquiry and its usefulness in gathering insightful stories for planning and strategic goals. We warmed up with some memory exercises and “on your feet’ sharing.
Carlson then shared her own story to open her part of the session. As the mother of two autistic boys, her work at Yarra has focused on inclusivity and creating a space for all types of children to enjoy stories. The Sensitive Storytime program affords all children, including those on the spectrum, a chance to participate. (Another initiative from Yarra—the Sensitive Santa program—shows how a library can provide a cherished holiday memory for children who might not be comfortable seeing Santa at a crowded mall.) The emotion in the room was palpable. Tip to presenters: be yourself, share your story honestly, and your audience will be right there with you.
THINGS KEEP GETTING BETTER
Macchion introduced the group to the Libraries Change Lives program, launched at Yarra Libraries in November 2018. Developed by Public Libraries Victoria Network and State Library Victoria, the project highlights the economic and social benefits public libraries bring to the state and their service areas by capturing stories of impact. Machion led the group in an exercise in which they shared their own stories of user transformation and library impact in round robin fashion. “Everyone spoke from the heart,” Macchion told me, and the energy just grew, with participants chanting “Libraries Change Lives” as each group shared their best examples.
Carlson noted, “participants walked away inspired and in touch with the difference they make in their daily professional lives.” Even after the conference, they continue to receive messages with positive comments, and from people wanting to connect further.
In my next column, I’ll share the unique technological angle that brought it all together.
Part 2: POWER OF THE POD
Last time, I wrote about our disparate group of presenters coming together to blend three session proposals focused on the power of stories into one 90 minute workshop at this year’s Next Library Conference in Aarhus, Denmark. Joining myself, Kylie Carlson and Felicity Macchion, from Yarra Libraries in Australia, was Jason Evans Groth, Digital Media Librarian at NCSU Libraries. His proposal came with yet another twist: it was focused on telling stories with podcasting.
Kylie Carlson, Jason Evans Groth, Felicity Macchion, and Michael Stephens presenting “The Power of Stories”
As detailed last time, our session at Next explored how to use narrative inquiry to better understand community needs, how to adapt story-based programming and services to accommodate children with neuro-diverse disabilities, and how to gather stories with simple, on-the-go, recording methods to create powerful artifacts. In the thick of the session, however, our allotted time flew by and Evans Groth knew exactly how to adapt. Here’s the rest of the story.
My Favorite Podcast
Many of us are carrying recording studios around with us in our pockets and bags in the form of smartphones and tablets,” Evans Groth told me. “We can, if we choose to, turn any space into a temporary recording studio. Recognizing this can do some powerful things for us.”
These days it seems everyone has a podcast or two they recommend. Evans Groth detailed the benefits of embracing this ultra popular medium in libraries as background on his session proposal.
If librarians practice using these technologies, they are empowered with the ability to take what might otherwise be ephemeral happenings and package them as stories which can easily be shared. It also helps to demystify the process of media making and illustrate how ubiquitous and easy-to-use this technology can be for the purpose of thoughtfully sharing stories.
More importantly, the tool allows us to raise all voices up. Evans Groth said: “If we help our patrons and our colleagues to share our library stories, we build and fortify a culture of accessibility and inclusion by making accessible the many stories that come out of our libraries.”
Pod Save Us
Evans Groth’s original proposal was a hands on how to record a podcast session. In an early Zoom meeting, Evans Groth realized “my session counterparts had something going for them that my initial proposal did not have: an emphasis on technology-free story-sharing and a more easy-to-see human focus.” There are many moments when the thought of using technology can create tension in a workshop, probably causing some folks to not be as interactive as they’d like to be. In a practice run at Dokk1 in Aarhus, further realization came: “Hearing the frameworks which we would provide to get our session attendees interacting made me think, immediately, that I did not want to get in the way with tech, even easy-to-use tech. Rather, my role would probably be more valuable if I used technology to quietly and accurately make the session go better and capture it to tell its story later.”
Evans Groth outfitted his co-presenters with iPads as recording devices and we caught the in-action thoughts of our attendees. When it was his turn to talk, Evans Groth pivoted from a technical step by step to a pep-talk, “telling our attendees how moved I was by the work they did in the session and by how lucky I felt to be involved in something so meaningful.” And then he enthusiastically hit the major talking points as concluding words for our audience: we should embrace the power of tech to tell stories, and podcasts are just sound files made by people just like them. The difference is that we are always thoughtful and passionate about stories.
Stuff You Should Know
Evans Groth’s take-away is one that we can all take to heart. It’s important to be open to the unknown, but it’s also important to document – and share – what happens when we are open to the unknown. Evans Groth is doing just that. He is assembling all the recordings into a podcast that will soon be available for everyone to hear. He said: “I’m flattered that so many participants thought what we did mattered and that I got to work with such great colleagues, and I feel privileged to still be hearing their voices as I put this lasting document together.”
My take away from this challenging endeavor? Story-based experiences of all kinds can increase listeners’ understanding of diverse groups, demonstrate the value of everyone’s experience, and remind listeners of their shared humanity.
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By Michael Stephens
Michael Stephens is Professor at the School of Information, San José State University, CA