senior patrons Archives | American Libraries Magazine

Librarian's Library by Araceli Mendez Hintermeister

Beyond the Bookshelves

By Araceli Méndez Hintermeister | September 3, 2024

Academic Libraries for Commuter Students: Research-Based Strategies Edited by Mariana Regalado and Maura A. Smale With commuter students making up most of the country’s undergraduate population, academic librarians need creative solutions to meet their diverse needs. This book, produced by a multidisciplinary team from City University of New York, provides examples of services specifically for … Continue reading Beyond the Bookshelves →

Sister Stella, a resident of Queen of Peace, a retirement community for nuns, plays with Henry. The robotic dog belongs to Ela Area Public Library in Lake Zurich, Illinois.

Librarian’s Pet

By Rosie Newmark | May 1, 2024

Kristan, outreach services coordinator at Ela Area Public Library (EAPL) in Lake Zurich, Illinois, knew that the presence of pets has been associated with health benefits like reductions in stress and blood pressure. In 2022, she introduced robotic pets to the library’s collection, taking them on visits to assisted living and memory care facilities to … Continue reading Librarian’s Pet →

Stock image of two women leaning on one another in a support group.

Holiday Healing

By Megan Bennett | December 13, 2023

El Progreso Memorial Library (EPML) in Uvalde, Texas, is one of an increasing number of libraries, with help from community partners, organizing programming about handling grief during the holiday season. EPML has been a center for grief recovery since May 25, 2022. The day before, the community faced the unimaginable tragedy of losing 21 community … Continue reading Holiday Healing →

Older Beginners

By Lynne Weintraub | June 1, 2023

It’s not unusual for libraries to offer English as a Second Language (ESL) and citizenship preparation programs. But Jones Library (JL) in Amherst, Massachusetts, has designed a program specifically for older adult beginners ages 50 and over. A college town that attracts workers and academics from around the world, Amherst has a higher immigrant population … Continue reading Older Beginners →

A member of Brooklyn Public Library's senior debate program participates in a debate hosted during the library's 2022 Older Americans Celebration Fair.

Making a Statement

By Megan Bennett | January 3, 2023

“Kids are very strong critical thinkers,” says the University of California, Berkeley, sophomore. “They’re natural at questioning the status quo.” Yet Tong says not many spaces exist for children to participate in conversations about social justice. In 2019, as a high school junior, Tong approached San José (Calif.) Public Library (SJPL) staffers with a programming … Continue reading Making a Statement →

Latest Library Links

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Genevieve Trainor writes: “The Guinness World Record holder for Most Prolific Book Thief is Ottumwa (Iowa’s) Stephen Blumberg. The 23,600 volumes he accumulated between the 1970s and his arrest in March of 1990 were all stashed in his 17-room home. Creighton University in Omaha, Nebraska, got involved with Blumberg as part of the FBI’s efforts to return the stolen manuscripts and rare books to their museums and libraries. Referred to as the Omaha Project, the information science proving ground involved four weeks, 44 catalogers and reference librarians and 600 volunteer hours to determine who might be the rightful owners.”

Little Village (Dubuque, Iowa), Dec. 4
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Casey Newton writes: “At the moment, no one knows for sure whether the large language models that are now under development will achieve superintelligence and transform the world. And in that uncertainty, two primary camps of criticism have emerged. The first camp, which I associate with the external critics, holds that artificial intelligence (AI) is fake and sucks. The second camp, which I associate more with the internal critics, believes that AI is real and dangerous. Today I want to lay out why I believe AI is real and dangerous.”

Platformer, Dec. 5
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Latia Ward writes: “One way to keep current with what students think of the library and its services is through Student Library Advisory Committee meetings. These meetings are a way to gather feedback and reinforce the library as a welcoming place. How do librarians create a welcoming environment within Student Library Advisory Committee meetings? Librarians create a welcoming environment through community, purpose, and dedicated space.” Also see part 1 of this blog post.

RIPS Law Librarian Blog, Nov. 13, Dec. 5
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Eleanor Hecks writes: “Few things are as frustrating to a user as when a site won’t respond. Unfortunately, it’s also an all-too-common scenario. Graceful degradation is a design approach that ensures the basics of a website will still function even if specific individual parts of it stop working. The approach removes single points of failure: just because one thing stops working doesn’t mean the system as a whole fails. A site following this principle fails in pieces instead of all at once, so the most important features remain available when some components encounter an error.”

Smashing Magazine, Dec. 6
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Camruinn Morgan-Rumsey and Lexi Lepof write: “On December 3, Knox County (Tenn.) schools received a list from the district of books to be removed from school libraries under Tennessee’s Age-Appropriate Materials Act. Knox County’s board of education voted in July, passing a policy to remove ‘explicit’ books from everyday student access in response to the new law. Some of the books on the list of nearly 50 titles might surprise parents. Among those to be removed are Shel Silverstein’s A Light in the Attic and Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five.”

WVLT-TV (Knoxville, Tenn.), Dec. 4
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Joe Foley writes: “Copyright rules vary from country to country and have changed over time. In the US, works created between 1929 and 1963 that gave notice and renewed copyright have 95 years from their first publication date. That means that on January 1, 2025, a host of works from 1929 will enter the public domain. This means that copyright will expire on Buck Rogers, Captain Easy, Horace Horsecollar, Tintin, Hal Foster’s first Tarzan comic strips and, yes, Popeye.” Other notable works entering public domain in the United States include the Marx Brothers’ first film, The Cocoanuts, contralto Marian Anderson’s first record, and Ernest Hemingway’s A Farewell to Arms.

Creative Bloq, Dec. 7; Everybody’s Libraries, Dec. 3, Dec. 7; Public Domain Review, Dec. 10
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Brittany Adams writes: “The digital landscape of libraries is expanding rapidly, with an increasing shift towards electronic resources and online services. As members of the library community, we’re witnessing a transformative era where physical collections are complemented—and sometimes replaced—by digital ones. This transition offers new opportunities for enhancing accessibility and engagement, but it also presents challenges, especially for young patrons and their families. It is essential to equip children and their caregivers with the tools and knowledge they need to navigate this evolving space confidently.”

ALSC Blog, Dec. 9

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