Rick Anderson writes about the "come to us" model of a library that he says, "worked well for those privileged with access to a good library", and I think that's true but it seems that both academic and public libraries work too hard to make themselves a "place" or a "destination". By doing that, it seems library staff spend an inordinate amount of time coming up with ideas for "entertainment" that will entice the community into the physical building. It's not that I see anything wrong with it, but library users will always be good library users (in most cases).

My concern is for those that are not library users. How do we reach them? Also, the importance of literacy - how do we reach parents that need to know how important it is to spend 10 or 15 minutes reading, doing numbers, doing the alphabet, spending "quality" time with their children in the evening? I think Rick Anderson is on to something when he states, "it means integrating our services into their daily patterns of work, study and play."

I did come across one public library system that, in conjunction with their Friends of the library, issues a literacy package to all mothers and fathers of newborn babies. They do this through the hospitals. The kit includes a board book and other information vital to the development of young children. In this way, all newborns and parents get a good start on how to encourage and develop their child's ability to learn plus an invitation to be library patrons!

One way I think SPPL succeeds to encourage patronage is their partnering with housing units (Rondo), and recreation centers (Highland) to make their library part of a multi-use complex.

Dr. Wendy Schultz talks about all the technological change, and change will go on and on and on. As a Blogdog librarian, we need to learn about and keep up with this change or get left behind. Lifelong learning, while hard, is so satisfying to this profession. And I think Dr. Schultz said it best, "Yet as more information becomes more accessible, people will still need experienced tour guides" That's us!