Cyberorganizing everyday heritage in and around public libraries: An exploratory study in Illinois

RQ1: How are public libraries addressing popular interest in everyday heritage? RQ2: How can cyberorganizing enhance these services?

25 Ideas to Serve Active Older Adults…Compiled by Allan M. Kleiman, Chair, ALA RUSA RSS

Library Service to an Aging Population Committee3. Start an Oral History Project on Community Life …

4. Celebrated Veterans Day with Oral History Events…5. Develop Inter-Generational Genealogy Projects7. Host a Program during Older Americans Month

for the 5 Oldest Community Residents10. Host a Book Discussion Program on

Best Sellers of the 1960’s and 1970’s15. Develop ‘fun’ Programming for Baby Boomers,

like, ‘Remembering the Beatles’21. Encourage the Local Historical Society to

Partner with the Library on Programming

Table 1: Demographic profile of down-state participantsChicago:16 participants

Kankakee:18 participants

Danville:20 participants

Carbondale:16 participants

Champaign-Urbana

Demographic Workshop Illinois U.S.A.

Age (median) 60 37 37

Women (%) 70 51 51

Bachelor’s degree + (%) 83 61 58

Post-Bachelor’s (%) 37 12 11

Children in house 12 30 30

House income (median) $50,000 $53,234 $50,054

White, non-Hispanic (%) 94 64 64

Who came to the workshops??• Middle-class older adults• Over-representation of white,

more educated women without children in the home

• How to build on this base of popular interest?

Library 1 Library 2 Library 3 Library 4Population 40000 28000 33000 25000Budget 10% of budget

to Archives dept.

Genealogy part of reference dept.

Archives dept. part of reference

No budget. Subscriptions to Ancestry.com

Staffing 2 full-time professional archivists

Reference librarians’ responsibility

1 half-time archivist

None

Technical Tools

Scanners, & Database

Local History Wiki

None None

Collaborations Genealogy Society

Genealogy Society

None None

Exhibit Space Yes None Yes NoneDiversity Special exhibit

during African-American History Month

Representing local Black history a priority

Black Family & Church History Days

African-American Heritage Quest

RQ1: How are public libraries addressing popular interest in everyday heritage?

RQ2: How can cyberorganizing enhance services?

Want to hear more? Lenstra, Noah. 2014. Cyberorganizing Everyday Heritage in and around Public Libraries: An Exploratory Study in Illinois. Public Library Quarterly. 33(1).

Bringing people together can spark change!Let’s do more of it!!