Glennis Coote of Tasman District Libraries talked to Te Rau Ora Library Life about the Tasman District heritage and oral histories project.

In 2021, Tasman District Libraries received funding from the New Zealand Partnership Programme (NZLPP)  to enable them to develop more material for their online heritage repository. “We received funding to move from Kete to the Recollect platform and to fund our staff member Pania Walton to gather oral histories as Pania already had training in this area.”
​
“The funding supported our strategic aim to treasure our community stories and history, building our heritage repository– Tasman Heritage. That’s why we took the opportunity to start gathering oral histories.”

​It started with the community quilt that began during the 2020 lockdown. In May 2020, Pania launched an invitation for people of all ages and stitching abilities across Te Tau Ihu, the top of the South, to stitch a word or image relating to their experience of level 4 lockdown to a piece of fabric to be included in a community quilt. The intention was to give the community a way to express their experiences and create a shared narrative around their collective experience. The result was the 2020 Lockdown Quilt. This resulted in other stories and was the start of the oral histories project.


Pania had a lot of connections with lots of places and she was able to interview a range of people. Some of those interviewed were people from the Riverside Community – in the Lower Moutere near Motueka. The community was founded by Christian Pacifists in 1941 and is Aotearoa New Zealand’s oldest intentional community.
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Next came interviews relating to Abel Tasman National Park. One contact led to another until there were a range of voices included in the oral histories. There is Ropata Taylor (Ngāti Rārua and Te Ᾱtiawa) chair of Ngāti Rārua Ᾱtiawa Iwi Trust Board, Sarah McClintock Suter Art Gallery curator and collections manager, Jeremy Glasgow bach owner and conservationist, and Renée Thomas (Ngāti Rarua, Ngāti Toa, Te Atiawa, Ngāti Tama, Ngāi Tahu) kaitiaki of the whenua at Mārahau. These oral histories provide a glimpse into a small sample of the wide range of relationships, experiences and histories contained in the Abel Tasman National Park area.

These are rich stories of people from communities steeped in history, culture and who are connected to their environment. The Tasman heritage project is an important resource for collecting local voices and stories for future generations.

“The feedback we have received has been really encouraging – it’s a slow burn but we have a long-term view that this is an investment for the future. Our Tasman Heritage repository is still in the early stages and some of our collections are still being digitised.”

Glennis says Tasman District Libraries plan to continue collecting stories. Pania has now moved on from the library, but volunteers are available and people are coming in with stories all the time. Besides oral histories, Tasman Heritage collections contain documents and images.
 

Pay equity is one of the library and information sector’s most pressing issues. Lack of pay equity has a flow-on effect on the ability of libraries to provide effective services and their ability to attract and keep staff.

In December last year, LIANZA held a webinar on pay equity and the current claims for school, university and public librarians and assistant librarians. This article is an update from that webinar and an opportunity to hear from some of the people involved in the claim processes.
 
WHAT IS PAY EQUITY? 
 
Until the Equal Pay Act was enacted in 1972, it was still legal to pay women and men different pay rates for the same work. This is the act that guides the work of pay equity. Fifty years later there is still unequal pay and processes that feed into large gender pay gaps.

In 2013 the Employment Court issued a decision that Kristine Bartlett’s care and support job was underpaid because it was done mainly by women and was a breach of the Equal Pay Act. In 2014 the Court of Appeal upheld the Bartlett decision taken by her union E tū, supported by Te Pūkenga Here Tikanga Mahi Public Service Association (PSA) and the New Zealand Nurses Organisation, and the Supreme Court dismissed the employer’s appeal.

Amendments to the Equal Pay Act (1972) came into effect on November 6, 2020 and introduced a new process for individual employees and unions to raise a pay equity claim directly with an employer for work, which may be subject to systemic sex-based discrimination.

The Equal Pay Amendment Act allows individual employees and unions to raise a pay equity claim directly with an employer, using a framework that is aligned with New Zealand’s existing bargaining framework[i].
Occupations, where work is predominantly carried out by men, have typically enjoyed better pay and conditions than female-dominated roles with comparable skills and responsibilities. Pay equity is about recognising this inequity and ensuring that these roles are valued fairly. 
 

Allison Dobbie read a eulogy at Mary’s funeral service on March 24 (which can be read in full here). In it she commented that Mary, “implemented clear succession plans for the future. She had a clear vision and a powerful ability to communicate and persuade. Town clerks and councillors were in awe of her and thought her formidable. She was mischievous and canny, and irreverent when necessary.  At her farewell before leaving to take up the role of National Librarian, she said of the public service  ‘there is only one rule, and that is don’t read the rule book.’ A practice I have tried to follow but largely failed. 
​
I wanted to paint the picture of these strong characteristics of her leadership that I experienced at Dunedin Public Library because they are evident throughout her career. Along with dedication – total dedication and love for the role and the people she worked with.”

​In 2018 Mangere Bridge local, Kahoa Corbett, and husband Brendan, established the Kolovai Library,
 
The very first public library in the Kingdom of Tonga. Since then, it has been packed with books donated from Auckland Libraries. Now that they are well-stocked for books, Kahoa would love to have more volunteers to help at the library, offering free accommodation near the library for people able to stay for several months or longer.
 
Volunteering includes cataloguing and shelving books, running activities like reading programmes, and helping with registering new customers especially children, mothers and babies, people from all walks of life.
 
The idea was borne from the devastation of Cyclone Gita in 2018, when Kahoa and Brendan were in Kolovai, Kahoa's home village, and saw that local schools needed books. They began to collect and donate books to the schools and when they discovered an unused whare ( fale ) in the village of Kolovai, it sparked the idea to turn it into a library.
 
Kolovai library was officially opened in 2019 by the New Zealand Acting High Commissioner Peter Lund and Prince Ata, the youngest son of the current King of Tonga.
 
Kahoa visited the library just a couple of months ago, and it is 'really going well' and is a great source of books and community where people gather for tea and coffee, which provided at the library along with free WIFI.

Volunteer with the Kolovai Public Library in Tonga
 
Come and enjoy working in the friendly TONGAN LIBRARY. Help encourage children, youth and adults to join up and borrow books or try your hand at cataloguing. Organise reading programmes, and different activities eg. art day, weaving day, cooking, and crafts 
 
Kolovai Library's Ben and Kahoa Corbett can offer you free accommodation, free WIFI and computers and 10 laptops already in the library, landline and mobile phone to use, free coffee and tea, lemon grass drink available fresh from the garden, lots of beaches and fresh fruit nearby and bicycles to use. It's 10-15 minutes biking to any of those beaches locally in Kolovai.
 
The library is very well secured and people of Kolovai and nearby villages are popping in and out to Kolovai Public Library Monday - Saturday. 

Want to volunteer or support Kolovai? 

• Email kahoacorbett@gmail.com

• Register to be a member nor donate to Kolovai Public Library

• Support Kolovai Public Library by making a donation www.kolovailibrary.wordpress.com
• People can also donate towards the Tongan library projects via the library's Kiwibank account 38-9000-0114295-01
•  find them on Facebook facebook.com/kolovailibrary

 
The Kolovai Library has been supported with donated goods and service from Auckland City Council, Auckland Libraries, Sky TV, Bunnings Mt Roskill, and Catalyst NZ. All of the books and equipment are shipped for free by Onehunga-based Freight Company CFR Line NZ.

Gifted by Maatakiwi Wakefield (Kāi Tahu whānui, Ngāti Mutunga, Te Ati Awa, Ngāti Toa, Ngāti Raukawa, Ngāti Maniapoto)
this image is of a piece of work created by her in 2017 for her Maunga Kura Toi - Bachelor of Māori Art (Weaving).

The whenu represent the different libraries within our sector that are woven together through LIANZA, represented by the aho. The patterns created through this style of weaving, are reflective of the variety of resources and services offered by the sector. The emiemi decorative strip represents the durability and resilience of the sector. Thus, as a collective piece, it symbolises the enduring value of libraries.

The colours are reflective of the whenua (earth) connecting us back to Papatūānuku (Mother Earth), upon which our sector stands.
 

• The white threads are whenu (warp or lengthwise threads) and aho (weft or cross threads used to bind/weave the whenu together). They are made from muka – flax fibre which has been specially prepared for the purpose of this type of weaving.
• The brown fibres are mountain emiemi or more commonly known as mountain neinei. It is a native plant that grows along Te Tiritiri o te Moana in Te Waipounamu. Emiemi is harvested after the snow melts, as this causes the older leaves to shed, and it is these leaves that are used in weaving. Because of its durability and resilience, Kāi Tahu traditionally used emiemi to construct pākē which they used as rain capes when crossing the Alps. 

 

​Lee Rowe, a member of the LIANZA Standing Committee on Copyright, reviews this important IFLA resource for libraries. Navigating Copyright for Libraries, Volume 181, was edited by Jessica Coates, Victoria Owen, and Susan Reilly and released in 2022 by de Gruyter publishing.

Recently I visited Auckland Art Gallery to see the exhibition of Mexican artists featuring works by Kahlo. I adored the experience of viewing the original paintings. Afterward, I had a look around the gallery shop. I was blown away by the rKahlo-related merchandise for sale. There were images copied onto cups, bags, throws, jewellery, tea towels, bibs, socks, and more. I was initially surprised about the extent of the reproduction. I then realised that copyright on Kahlo’s works expired some time ago, and her work is now in the public domain. In principle, re-using her work for either non-commercial or commercial purposes is fair game. However, there is a complex web of other factors affecting re-use. These include trademarks that have been applied to her work meaning that the process is not straightforward. A summary of the issues is here in Laurel Wickersham Salisbury’s 2019 article – it’s fascinating reading.

I mention Frida Kahlo’s work as an example of the sometimes-fraught area of copyright. As information professionals, many of us will have faced challenging copyright issues. The issues continue to increase in complexity, so we need all the guidance we can get. This was the driver for the publication Navigating Copyright for Libraries.

The book is an informative, interesting, and useful reference for anything copyright. You can dip in and out of the 40 chapters on various aspects of copyright – from historical development to current-day issues, strategies, case studies, and opportunities.

With contributions by 20 authors, there is a range of perspectives. There is some repetitive content, but this is not a negative – in fact, the different expression of ideas helps deepen understanding of the tricky issues involved. The book is well-edited, strongly referenced and has a useful introduction with abstracts and conclusions for each chapter. There is a lively account of the background of the development of copyright following the introduction of printing.
Societal discontent about the monopoly privileges that the book trade developed, accompanied by the suppression of ideas by church and state, led to the foundational concepts of copyright that still exist today. This historical context is important for an understanding of the copyright issues that we currently face. The book includes basic and advanced information about copyright, covers issues around digitisation, digital lending, and controlled digital lending. Limitations and exceptions such as the Marrakesh Treaty are covered.

​The inconsistent definition of “originality” which has caused conflict over reproductions of digitised public domain material is explored, as is the use of Technological Protection Measures and artificial intelligence. There are helpful chapters on open access, creative commons, copyright education, information literacy, and why these matter, with several good case studies. The COVID-19 pandemic, and concessions from publishers that resulted in libraries being able to temporarily share more resources, are highlighted. Librarians were able to support fairer and more equitable access to knowledge, which surfaces the question of how libraries might be able to retain this stronger position. The editors show recognition that the global system of copyright that we operate under has been developed by the dominant areas of Europe and the US, and questions what the benefits are for others.

There is also an excellent discussion by two indigenous Australian authors about how the public domain has been used as a justification for the appropriation of traditional and indigenous knowledge, and the assumption that this knowledge is freely available for use. The authors stress how important it is to acknowledge traditional knowledge rights when considering the public domain and advocate for specialised exceptions and limitations for copyright to help reconcile the conflict between copyright, the public domain, and traditional knowledge. The book explains why understanding copyright is essential for information professionals. We operate from a position of balancing the different interests – we support the sharing of knowledge for the benefit of our communities, whilst simultaneously recognising and supporting creators. This is a position that few others operate from, and our role as advocates is vital.

The editors’ goal for this book was that it be “an open and accessible primer which would provide librarians with a solid grounding in the origins and fundamentals of copyright law, and insight into the international dimensions of copyright law both in terms of what is currently at risk and what can be achieved with effective advocacy”. The book achieves this goal by providing clear explanations and (fascinating at times) discussion of the issues. Being open access, parts of the book can be reused, remixed, translated, updated, and integrated into other educational resources.

​The editors “expect and hope” this will occur. Now that’s an opportunity for us, and hopefully one less fraught than any re-use of the works of Frida Kahlo.

Navigating Copyright for Libraries Volume 181, published by de Gruyter, 2022, is available to download from the IFLA or de Gruyter website and can be ordered in print.

​At the end of last year, the Ministry for Business, Innovation and Employment (MBIE), Aotearoa’s largest public research funder, announced a new Open Research Policy.

The news was significant in that it represents New Zealand’s first Government-initiated mandate to open up access to publicly funded research, a position which finally begins to bring the country into line with much of Europe, the US, and a number of major research funders in Australia.

While the move is likely to lead other key research funders in this country to follow suit, the hope is that it provides the catalyst for the development of a te Tiriti-led framework for open research for Aotearoa. MBIE’s policy, which came into effect on 1 January 2023, requires all peer-reviewed articles and conference proceedings arising from MBIE funding to be made open access. That means research which may previously have been locked behind publisher paywalls will be able to be read, shared, and built upon by the public, whose taxes have gone towards funding it.

Open access to research is not only an issue of fairness, it increases the real-world impact of research, leads to swifter innovation, brings about new collaborations and has clear benefits to society. While many tertiary librarians will be familiar with the importance of open access, this development is also relevant to those working in public, school and specialist libraries, where guiding users to sources of reliable, authoritative information often has its limitations.

This policy is a step towards reducing inequality of access. It offers two pathways for researchers to make their work open. Via open-access journals, many of which charge often excessive and somewhat arbitrary article processing charges. Or via institutional repositories, where the ‘author accepted manuscript’ (AAM) of a version published in a subscription-based (paywalled) journal can be made freely available, subject to publisher embargoes of no more than 12 months.

Repositories offer the public, practitioners, independent researchers and community groups free and often unencumbered access to large collections of theses, dissertations and unembargoed research articles.

Aotearoa’s eight universities already have policies in place designed to increase the number of AAMs made open in their repositories. Only AUT’s policy explicitly requires journal articles and conference papers to be ‘open by default’. The impact of MBIE’s funder policy, and any subsequent funder mandates which emerge as a result, may lead to tertiary institutions updating and strengthening their policies to make them consistent with the requirements of the MBIE policy.

However, it is the potential for this development to instigate a collective, nationwide approach to the formation of policies and frameworks for open research which is of unique significance for Aotearoa. Should such an opportunity be seized, its approach must be informed by and honour te Tiriti o Waitangi, and WAI 262 in particular, which addresses issues of sovereignty and autonomy of Mātauranga Māori.

The MBIE policy is an important and progressive step towards sharing the benefits of research, it is also a chance to develop strategy, behaviours and a culture which ensures the management, storage and sharing of research is te Tiriti-led, centres marginalised and indigenous voices, and reflects the distinct place of Aotearoa in the Pacific.

Napier Libraries is on a mission to bring whānau back into the library post-COVID. Kate Powis and Ellen Burgess talk about how Napier Libraries’ summer holiday programme aimed to make a splash in their community.

POST-LOCKDOWN BLUES

Like many libraries in the wake of COVID, we found getting people to our programmes a struggle. This was the perfect opportunity to review our programmes and propose new and innovative ways to inspire engagement with the library. Our principal focus was on families, communities, and the 10+ age group which had the largest drop in attendance.

​We implemented new programming from July, testing the waters and gauging interest. This fed into our planning for the summer holiday programme. Our aims were to provide programmes for children of all ages and activities for the whole whānau. Accessibility to all, an important cornerstone of our library strategy, and taking programmes into the community were also important.
​

PLANNING

Our Summer Reading Programme theme this year was “the beach,” and many of our activities featured this theme. We brainstormed potential events, and invited individuals and organisations to collaborate, planning the long holiday period to ensure varied activities targeting all age groups were featured weekly. Funding from Eastern and Central Community Trust supported the running of our reading programmes and associated activities.

ACTIVITIES, ENGAGEMENT AND OUTCOMES

Beach-themed activities
The Adopt a Shell programme was a summer-long initiative, where children issuing a book could choose a shell to adopt and read to each day. The response was staggering, with more than 300 shells finding new homes. Mermaid Ria’s Storytime saw over 80 tamariki enjoy stories, songs, and the chance to meet a real-life mermaid. Our Code Cracker saw many tamariki search the library for clues to decode a beach-themed message. At our busy Green Screen sessions, families could choose a beach-themed backdrop for their photo.

Family-friendly activities
Several events were held for families to enjoy together, including after-hour activities. Our daytime All Blocks Lego® sessions were well-attended, with many families building together. Participants then chose a beach-themed background for a green screen photo of their creations. Our Family Summer Quiz night was a lively occasion Issue 495 17 enjoyed by fifteen teams. The Family Board Game night, held in collaboration with the Hawkes Bay Geeks Guild, saw more than 30 attendees entertained by a range of games. We were fortunate to have Suzy Cato visit us, with over 600 excited people attending her events. The scheduled Teddy Bears’ Picnic became an indoor Storytime due to bad weather but was still wellattended by tamariki and their toys. Twenty-four toys stayed for a sleepover and got up to lots of mischief! The tamariki enjoyed collecting their photo booklet of the sleepover antics.

Teens and tweens
We ran two Escape Rooms through the holidays targeting this age group – Wizards' Academy and Library Quest. Positive word-of-mouth resulted in fully booked sessions. The Wizards’ Academy debuted during the October holidays and was repeated in the summer due to the 30-team-long waiting list!! Our Murder Mystery was a riot, with 13 participants grilling suspects and examining evidence to find out who killed famous author Bill Shakesbeard. Additionally, we ran workshops in sewing, tee shirt bleaching and accessory-making which were all at capacity.

Technology
Providing exposure to varied technologies has long been one of our aims. Virtual reality has been a popular recent addition to our programme, with children registering for 15-minute sessions enjoying their choice of experience. Additionally, we offered sessions with Dash robots, and Stop Motion and Movie Making workshops. All these programmes were easily run and generated waiting lists.

Out and about in the community
To connect with those less likely to visit the library in person, we planned three days of events in the community revolving around our mobile library, featuring activities such as scavenger hunts and rock painting. Keeping to our beach theme, we also teamed up with our friends at the National Aquarium of New Zealand for “Library by the Sea”, involving a rocky shore scavenger hunt. Our ever-popular Storywalk® also returned with seven stories in two locations. We were pleased with the overall success and attendance of these days, proving that going into the community builds connections.

LEARNINGS
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Overall, we were happy with the programme content, attendance and feedback received, and all our aims and objectives were met. Sadly, the weather impacted on some outdoor events resulting in some rejigging to ensure activities could be run indoors. Next time, we would include thorough wet-weather back-ups in our planning stage. We also hope to streamline new activities such as the Murder Mystery to make them even better experiences for all. Additionally, we underestimated preparation and running time for some first-time events. An example was our Teddy Bears’ Sleepover when our after-hours photo session took longer than anticipated. Our learning from this is to overestimate timings for new​ activities, and to ensure ample preparation time for events to deliver the best event possible.

​In this article, Anna Lockwood talks about her role as Senior Advisor Inclusive Services, Auckland Council Connected Communities, the key challenges faced in public libraries, and the Central Hub Safe Spaces Pilot Project. She uses practice-based evidence and shares what she has learnt from library social work collaborations in Tāmaki Makaurau and in Melbourne. Anna was a presenter at the Social Work in Libraries conference (SWiL2022) in December 2022.

ORGANISATIONAL CONTEXT

My role sits within the Community Impact Unit and the wider Connected Communities Department. Connected Communities oversee the integrated delivery of services from Council’s community centres, libraries, community hubs and arts facilities. The key outcomes of this role are:

• Communities experiencing complex needs belong and participate in our libraries, arts facilities, and community centres
• Staff are capable, confident, and safe when working with communities experiencing complex needs. These outcomes point to the need to be intentional when balancing the needs of staff and the needs of communities experiencing complex needs.

KEY CHALLENGES OUR SPACES ARE FACING

In an age of ever-increasing unaffordable housing, increasing privatisation and control of urban space, along with public services moving online or closing altogether, people with complex needs are increasingly forced to live out their private lives in these public spaces like libraries. As a result, we are seeing the role of public libraries changing. Today, public libraries are picking up the slack where other centres are not responding, and it can create some real challenges for staff and the communities we work with. Several scholars have written about these intersecting issues. Some of which include:

• Staff becoming ‘first responders’ wanting to help, but not always knowing how to
• This rhetoric of “I am a librarian, not a social worker.”
• ‘Vocational awe’, ‘romanticisation’ and ‘fetishization’ of care
• Lack of appropriate resources, inadequate training and awareness of social issues leads to punitive/inconsistent service responses, risking further harm to staff and retraumatising people who are already marginalised
• Increase in incident reports, trespass-related incidents and police attendance. Incident management, it swallows up a lot of resources. If we’re not careful, organisations can start to reflect the crisis that some of our patrons may be experiencing, and it creates this constant ‘fight’ or ‘flight’ mode.
• 'Dominant narrative of ‘safety’ and ‘security’ – “Incidents feels like all we do”.

While there is no doubt that significant incidents occur in libraries, we also need to be careful about how we frame incidents and what we mean by them, as this can skew data and perceptions of safety. In addition, if we frame behaviour only through a security and safety lens, then this will likely lead to more safety and security outcomes, and more spending on these. Like increased surveillance and the hiring of guards, rather than being able to address the associated needs that may be driving the behaviour. Some scholars have also talked about the surveillance drift with the increasing tracking of patrons and them being labelled “problem patrons”. At the same time, regular exposure to incidents, along with a lack of protective organisational systems can lead to vicarious trauma and burnout. In short, these factors are challenging and complex for everyone.

HOW WE ARE RESPONDING

This role has a regional focus, so to increase impact, we are prototyping and testing solutions at one site and as we work, we are adapting and scaling practice across the region. At the same time, we are learning from the work that’s being carried out at other sites and internationally too. Central Hub which includes the Central City Library, the Ellen Melville Centre, and the Albert Cottage was chosen as a test site due to experiencing the highest rate of security-related incidents and trespass notices, along with an acute culmination of the challenges mentioned earlier. Initially, we were tasked with reviewing the trespass process. But we knew that if we only looked at trespass, then we would only find security tools. Instead, we created the Central Hub ‘Safe Spaces Pilot Project’. This project aims to take a holistic approach to address behaviour that holds the inequities our communities experience in view, while also balancing the health, safety, and wellbeing of staff. This project is a collaborative and joined-up effort involving the Central Hub manager, the Central Hub team leaders, and Central Hub staff, along with our partners. We are looking inward, across, and outward to strengthen existing partnerships and build new ones.

INITIATIVES WE ARE PROTOTYPING AT CENTRAL HUB

​The initiatives we are piloting as part of Central Hub Safe Spaces Pilot Project include developing a practice toolkit, piloting training, creating opportunities for people with lived experience such as a recent art exhibition and panel discussions, developing critically reflective practice through peer supervision, engaging tertiary student placements from the school of social work and the school of public health, and we are also planning to establish a library support worker pilot. I will briefly outline one of these examples, the Peer Supervision Program.

PEER SUPERVISION PILOT PROGRAMME

One of the initiatives we have been piloting at Central Hub is peer supervision. Indeed, library staff are not ‘social workers’ or ‘mental health professionals’, yet library staff are working with some of our most marginalised communities daily and they need tools to cope. In my research and in my previous role at the City of Melbourne, I’ve found that implementing avenues for critically reflective practice through processes like peer supervision can help staff to navigate some of the complex challenges they are facing.

​The purpose of peer supervision is to provide a space for education, support, and accountability. It encourages peer-to-peer learning through drawing on expertise that is already in the room and on the other hand, helps to identify training needs and gaps in knowledge. It provides an avenue for peer support as it systematises organisational care and allows staff to share and listen to the daily realities of working in the library. It also increases accountability by providing a space to map available policies, processes, and resources and reviewing whether these are followed/not followed. If they are not followed or used, why not? Is it because no one knows about them? Are they no longer practical? What improvements could we suggest or make? Overall, it creates a structured environment for critical reflection.

OUTCOMES

All staff have attended at least one session, with 81 staff attending 14 sessions. We have also developed peer supervision guidelines to support the program to be implemented, adapted, and scaled. The best outcome of all is that staff have reported embedding what they’ve learned in their daily practice.

IN SUMMARY

Through library social work collaborations, we can test and try things out. Social work roles in public libraries help us to probe what constitutes ‘place’ and reveal how social issues can be dealt with beyond welfare institutions and in public spaces like libraries. This helps us to resist becoming fixated on the pathology of individuals and problematising that structural issues like poverty and homelessness are caused totally by an individual's own doing. I believe that public libraries are well-placed to share stories of the inequities that their communities are experiencing. We need to share these stories to advocate for more structural and systemic reforms so we can work toward rearranging our systems around restoration, well-being, and healing.

​Presenters considered how the psycho-social needs of people using libraries (primarily public libraries) could be supported through the provision of social work services in libraries, and how library staff could be introduced to trauma-informed practice to support clients and enhance their own wellbeing. A further strand of the symposium was exploring what social workers can learn from librarians. This symposium was of particular interest to me as my role as the sole information specialist within the New Zealand Family Violence Clearinghouse team brings me into contact with people who have experienced violence and trauma. That contact is usually by phone, limiting the opportunities for support.

Dr Keren Dali1 focused on the intersection of social work and library and information science. Social workers need to embrace information communications technology (ICT) and ensure that it benefits their clients, while ensuring that the digital divide does not replicate or exacerbate existing inequalities. Keren argues that social work education needs to better equip social workers with an understanding of the ethics, security and privacy issues of ICT and the way information access, information poverty, and information overload issues may impact their clients.

The presentation on trauma-informed librarianship by Dr Beth Wahler2 was particularly valuable. Beth’s research and practice has focused on how to apply a trauma-informed approach to both supporting patrons with psycho-social needs and supporting library staff who engage with these people. She explained that the first step is to understand what trauma is and how it affects people’s behaviour. While social workers in libraries can collaborate with librarians to create a trauma-informed organisation, there are also strategies for libraries that do not have on-site social workers. Applying trauma-informed care can reduce violent or unpleasant incidents and this can reduce library staff burnout. You can read more on this topic in Creating a person-centered library3 when it is published in 2023.

Patrick Lloyd4 advocated for libraries as safe spaces and a protective factor in patrons’ lives. He made the point that social workers need to challenge the status quo to achieve social justice and that library managers need to understand that role and include social workers in the development of library policy and staff training. The balance of the presentations focused on the various models for having social workers in libraries. First-hand experience and research from the United States, Australia, and most interestingly from New Zealand, were presented. Most research has focused on the type of social worker employment - whether they are full or part-time, volunteers, or interns (social work students), employed by the library or by an external agency. Other aspects to consider are how the social worker functions within the library – in an outreach style, approaching patrons who may need help or offering a space where patrons can come for social work appointments. Whether the social worker is directly involved in de-escalating incidents, staff training and policy setting are also issues to consider.

PhD candidate Mary Provence’s5 research from urban libraries across the United States focused on how the role of social workers in libraries impacted incident de-escalation. Symposium participants from Australia and New Zealand were shocked at the level of violence and the number of armed security personnel, including police officers, deployed within the libraries surveyed. Panellists from Australia discussed the benefits, challenges, and limitations of working as qualified social workers and being involved in student placements within libraries.

From New Zealand, Anna Lockwood6 described her pathway into social work in libraries and described key challenges faced by Auckland Libraries. Anna talks about the work undertaken as part of the Central Hub Safe Spaces Project in this issue of Library Life. To continue the conversation, there is a call for papers for a special issue of the Journal of the Australian Library and Information Association (JALIA) to be published in December 2023, focusing on delivering social work services in libraries. The issue will bring together researchers and practitioners interested in the interdisciplinary approach and its benefit to both library users and staff. Follow this link.

​You can learn more about the speakers and access the presentations and other resources here.

1. Dr Keren Dali, Assistant Professor, Research Methods & Information Science Dept., Morgridge College of Education, University of Denver
2. Dr Beth Wahler, Director of the School of Social Work at the University of North Carolina, Charlotte
3. Wahler, E.A., & Johnson, S. C. (2023). Creating a Person-Centred Library: Best practices for supporting high-needs patrons. ABC-CLIO. https://www.abc-clio.com/products/ a6528p/
4. Patrick Lloyd, Clinical Assistant Professor, The University of Texas at Austin, Steve Hicks School of Social Work
5. Mary Provence, LCSW, PhD Candidate, Indiana University School of Social Work, Indianapolis, Indiana
6. Anna Lockwood, Senior Advisor - Inclusive Services, Connected Communities. Te Kaunihera o Tāmaki Makaurau