 Good morning and welcome to this week's edition of Encompass Live. I am your host, Krista Porter, here at the Nebraska Library Commission. Encompass Live is the commission's weekly webinar series where we cover a variety of topics that may be of interest to libraries. We broadcast the show live every Wednesday morning at 10 a.m. Central Time, but if you're unable to join us on Wednesdays, that's fine. You can always watch our recordings. We can record the show every week. Our archives are available right here on our main Encompass Live page underneath the link right here to our archive shows. Underneath our upcoming shows, you can always watch them there. Both the live show and the recordings are free and open to anyone to watch. So please do share with your friends, family, neighbors, colleagues, anyone you think may be interested in any of the topics we have on the show. For those of you who are not from Nebraska, the Nebraska Library Commission is the state agency for libraries. In other states, that would be your state library, probably called your state library. So we provide services to all sorts of libraries in the state, training, consulting, grants, etc. So you will find things on our show for all sorts of libraries, academics, K-12s, publics, corrections, special museums, general archives. Really, it just runs the gamut. Our only criteria is that it is something for libraries, something libraries are doing, something cool we think they could be doing, all sorts of things you'll find on our show. Sometimes we have Nebraska Library Commission staff that do presentations of things that are specific to resources or services we're offering through the commission and sometimes bringing guest speakers from across Nebraska and across the country. Before we pop into today's show, I'm going to do a quick reminder, as I've been doing every week, since March, we are still in the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Yes, there is vaccine, yay. But it's going to be months and months before that is completely everyone has that and it takes, fixes everything. But we still have here on our, we have been since March on our Library Commission website, gathering resources to help our libraries deal with how to deal with the pandemic. We have a list here of Nebraska libraries, who's open, who's closed, what kind of special services are they offering, curbside pickup, etc. But also now who's re-closed with flare-ups, libraries who had opened or not closing. I'm trying to keep that as up to date as we can. If you're in Nebraska Library, let us know if we have any need to change any of your libraries info. But I'll show you here on our, this post that's there at the top of our Library Commission webpage. This is pinned here to the top of our page. It'll always be there right first for you to see right when you first come to the page. And we have links to maps we've put together, a form to submit information about your library. But then here's our sub-page with different information, things you can use with your patrons, help them with unemployment, homeschooling my kids, what to do for fun. But then the second link here is also specifically, I want to highlight that for you as the library, how to run things behind the scenes, closing, reopening. We've tried to pay attention to and gather any information from the CDC, World Health Organization, OCLC, IMLS, ALA, anybody who's putting out information or guidance or webinars and things we've put on here. Specific information for school libraries. Here in Nebraska, something to be aware of the Open Meetings Act. Your meetings do have to be open, but there is a one, our governor has made some executive orders that help make that easier. But in the Open Meetings Act itself, there has always already been a, the ability that you can have people come in to join your meetings. This is for library board meetings via phone or video conference or Zoom or whatever. So I just want to make sure that people know that that is available. It's something, it's right there in our Nebraska state statutes. If you're not from Nebraska, look at your own states. This is Nebraska. So I just want to make sure everybody knows this information is there for our libraries. A lot of this information is for anybody. So everybody's welcome to come to this page. But check with your local, your own state library or your state library association, they may be doing the same thing for you as well. So let's get into today's show now. I am going to hand over, present your control to you, Amber, so you should now see that pop up to bring up your slides. All right. Yep, I see it. And we are doing main screen, right? That's what we decided was best. Which everyone has a little glowy thing on it. Yeah, it'll, it'll show you. I'll tell you and let you know, pick one. It is showing my screen and I'm going to pop this over to do presentation. Oh, that's me. Move me. No problem to present. There we go. There we go. All right. So this morning with us, we're going to talk about teens, teen volunteers. Yay. Amber Lovelace is from Queens Public Library in New York City, New York being my home state gate. And she's going to talk to us about how she's worked with her teens. And so I will get them to volunteer and help out at the library with all sorts of things. So I'm just going to hand it over to you, Amber, to take it away and take it away and tell us what you've been doing. Okay, thank you. So just to let you know, I have reduced my, our go to web thing so I cannot see it at all. That's how I rely for everything else. Okay. I will keep everything from my side for you. No problem. Thank you so much. Hello, everyone. Thank you for all, all of you for tuning in today. And thank you to Krista, the Nebraska Library Commission for inviting me here to talk with you about leading teen volunteers. As Krista said, my name is Amber Lovelace. I'm an assistant manager for Queens Public Library at the Queensboro Hill Branch. I'm also a teen librarian. Before I worked for Queens Public Library, I spent three years as a volunteer coordinator, and I've been a volunteer myself for several years. I hope you'll find my experience is helpful as you're growing your own teen volunteer programs. So this is a bit weird because this presentation was originally created back in February and I gave it for the Public Library Association Conference. So in a way it's kind of a time capsule because, because Queens Public Library is not having volunteers in person anymore. And so what we've done is we've taken this and and done our best to transform it into into a virtual program. But what I'm hoping is that you will still get things out of it. I mean volunteers will come back eventually. I don't know what your situation is. Maybe your library is having volunteers now, but because this is being recorded, I think that, you know, down the line with volunteers come back, it's going to be something you might watch again. But for now, let's consider it kind of a time capsule, but with the idea that we are working towards adapting this into a virtual environment. So we'll talk a little bit about that as as we go along to which I think both I think both of those ways of doing it will help people long into the future. Because I know we're learning that a lot of work is being done because you have to from home actually works from home. Yeah, so this might be another way of getting volunteers they don't always have to come to the library even after all this is over. So what are the things that you can create and come up with that they can do as a remote volunteer. Yeah, that's what we're that's what we're finding and a lot of the teams that are coming from this volunteer program, they do adapt into the virtual world. So this model for a team volunteer program, it needs someone who likes teens to run it. And it also helps if you enjoy spreadsheets. And you hate spreadsheets. This probably is not the right program model for you. But if you have any interaction with volunteers, I do find the presentation valuable. So all the slides you're going to see today and in fact the entire PowerPoint are pictures taken by the volunteers and made by the volunteers of the volunteers. So they have asked me to point things out to you because they're very proud of their work. And I am happy to do that because I am very proud of them. Now, several of my team volunteers are still with us. We're all figuring out together this virtual thing in partnership with many of my colleagues at Queens Public Library. In particular, I want to recognize Melissa Milano, who is coordinator of teen services, Rafael Ortiz, who is my co-chair and the Y programing committee, and also runs the co runs the teen advisory board that we just created together with me. And also Scott McLeod and Delisi Caraballo, who are the Queens Public Library volunteer services department of the thousand or so volunteers that Queens Public Library has these to make sure that everything runs smoothly among them. Now, I began with three volunteers in 2018. They had a three month commitment, two hours per week. Then one girl came and asked if she could do 25 hours in two weeks. She swore she would continue for the two and a half months after that. I was hesitant because the onboarding process for volunteers is a long one at Queens Public Library, especially for teens, because they have to do different forms. We have what I don't know other states do this, but we have what they call work working papers or if you're if you're young. We have those two in Nebraska. Yes, they have a lot of their age. Yep. Exactly. So I said yes, but you can you can probably guess what happened. She quit via email the the second her 25 hours were up. So after her, I took an assessment of the ratio of my work input versus my value gained, and it wasn't in my favor. So I decided I needed to make a change the volunteer program. And the main problem is that at that time it was not a program. So around that time, one of my regulars what am I just teens who wasn't a volunteer just came in every day. He asked if he could volunteer to get service credits for graduation, and he needed to do work that involved animals. As it happened, I had a program called Pamper Shelter Pet where teens make toys for animals living at a local adoption shelter. So it was an easy thing to do that required basically no effort on my part. After this, I decided to incorporate projects into the volunteer program. So I hoped it would give the teens more autonomy and ownership of the volunteering experience. So this brings us to the Queensboro Hill teen volunteer program. So the mission of the Queensboro Hill teen volunteer program is to provide positive enriching work experiences for teens and encourage friendship collaboration, a sense of individual accomplishments and a better understanding of Queens Public Library. Again, time capsule this doesn't happen anymore but at that time teen volunteers were expected to attend a monthly group meeting and to complete a monthly report. They had a daily checklist to complete as well as a special project. So the current incarnation started in January 2019. Right now I have 2019s from 12 high schools. Since we stopped onsite volunteering, not all of them are currently active. Overall, I've had 37 volunteers. Almost all of the teens who've left did complete their requirements. The ones who didn't they maintain regular communication with me and the doors always open for them to come back. Four of them who completed their requirements, they came back to were hired by the library and of my original three to are still with us. They left a big change from that girl who disappeared after an email. So here we have a few of my of my volunteers, they, they staged all of their photos. So some of these are kind of unintentionally and some intentionally hilarious but they stage all their photos and it just makes me just so happy to look at these right now. But they're organizing magazines, doing homework help. And I don't know what Suzanne and Mavis are doing in the first picture. I think they're pretending to be planning something so. Okay. So, let's talk a little bit about Roblox, but first, this, this is Karen, and Karen is Karen basically did the PowerPoint presentation along with along with another boy Derek. And when I, when I asked Karen, if she knew how to do, if she knew anything about PowerPoint. I've never seen a teenager happier in my life is when I asked Karen that question. So, yeah, okay. So I talked to other library staff about their issues in developing successful team volunteer programs. And here are the most common problems that I heard, and certainly that I experienced for myself. Problem one, it's not worth the time and effort. Problem two, the teens don't commit and problem three, the teens or you lose motivation. I was able to draw on my volunteer experiences to make positive changes. And that's why I made this presentation. That's why I'm here today is to try and help you. So let's talk about problem one. Problem one, it's not worth the time and effort. Managing teen volunteers can be incredibly rewarding, but it's also a lot of work. So what makes the volunteer program worth it to you? What do you get out of it? Some of that answer is going to be very personal to you depending on what you want. But there are also solid benefits that we all get. It's developing leadership skills, meeting your goals, it's management experience. But on the teen side, why would a teen want to volunteer with you? Have you thought about it? Can you articulate it to a teen? What do they get out of it aside from service hours? So solution, let's make this rewarding. So first hand guidelines, you need to understand your organizations, volunteer guidelines. And if you don't have any, you need to talk to the appropriate people in your library and create them. This includes anything you need to know to keep your program running smoothly and not accidentally violate a protocol. Such as required documents, the minimum time commitment for volunteers, the onboarding process and training for new volunteers. They need to know what type of behavior is expected. This is vital for teenagers, especially if they've never worked before. You need to set them up for success from the start. And we want to create a volunteer program provides positive enriching work experiences for teens. So my original program structure, as I said, consists of daily tasks and long and short term projects. While we don't do the daily tasks anymore, we do still have projects. So all of our tasks are inspired by the question, what can we do to make the library a welcoming space? The tasks that you decide, they should be based on what is important for you in your library. So the projects I assigned are based on the teen's interests and the library's needs. The end result will either be a resource for the public or change that will make the library better. They should also be a resume booster for the teen. So to give you some project examples, David and Derek are working on a financial literacy guide for teens. My second David, I have two Davids, my second David, he made a flyer with tips for analyzing new sources. He wrote a manual to help other kids understand the New York City high school application process, which is, I'm so thankful for this manual. Other librarians are like, can I have this manual? Absolutely. So Nate said that he likes to interpret difficult texts. So he analyzed and simplified the instructions of a very complicated tabletop game. So our tween gaming club could play it. Several of our volunteers help process donations. They do bulletin board displays for me. They've created special display cards that are now permanent. We have a pride card and a college card that they are responsible for updating. And they have relabeled my entire YA section. Teen volunteers deliver program flyers to their schools with an introduction letter from me. This puts them on the radar and allows them to meet relevant faculty in their schools. It lets me know that the faculty who don't respond to my outreach emails are actually getting my information. Prior to the physical shutdown, they were reading and writing recommendations for every YA book in our collection. So my teens have a varying levels of experience and ability, but because I've been able to match projects to their interests and because I'm able to give them time to redo things if need be, they put the effort in and they succeed. So to me, there is something very special about teenagers who want to volunteer in the library. If you are able to give group assignments, group work is where friendships are formed. The teens, they sort out individual strengths and contributions. I used to worry when I put all the teens together that the shy teens wouldn't be heard, but I was wrong. When you have the chance to let a group of teens work independently and then come back and see what they've done, it's wonderful. Every part of the volunteer program is designed to help teens develop their agency and create growth opportunities. I want my volunteers to be able to work independently and feel a part of a team. I have an area designated where they can find directions, they find the teen checklist, that's their daily tasks, and they find any updates for me. So, and then we pair up season volunteers to mentor new volunteers. Everybody writes a monthly report. It's just two paragraphs answering two questions. Did your experience this month meet your expectations and what recommendations do you have for improving the library? I've even created project ideas from their monthly reports. I use feedback forms to let the teens assess me and the volunteer program. They make suggestions for changes as well as request one-on-one meetings. Our monthly meeting lets them share what they're doing and they all look forward to seeing each other. I have several teens from the same school who didn't know each other before they started volunteering. I found out since the physical shutdown that now they even have a text chain with each other. So, they have formed their friendship and they have run with their friendship. So, now let's talk about growth opportunities. A good volunteer program is going to help you too. This is your chance to develop your leadership skills. This is your mini staff. So, for me, it turned out that I was it was 63 hours each week of management opportunity. So, you get to practice putting the needs of the library into a context that could be converted into duties and projects for the volunteers. You will develop relationships with other departments. You get to interact with teens in a new way. You will develop your interviewing skills and your ability to align the teens' interests with your library's needs, which ultimately gives you a fresh view of the library. Now, that seems like a lot of work. So, let's talk about protecting your time. If you want a day when no one volunteers, you can have it. So, last year, Wednesday was my no volunteers day. It's okay to do that. The schedule should work for you. If a teen comes to your library or emails you whatever the situation is now, and they ask you about volunteering, you give them the five minute overview. That's your mission. That's the basic requirements and that's how to apply. And then I conduct one hour group information sessions once a month for teens with completed applications. For teens who need their hours quickly, I guide them to pamper a shelter pet during our five minute meeting. They can decide if they want to volunteer officially after they're done. So, and lastly, you delegate tasks to volunteers. Give teens guidance and freedom and give yourself practice and trusting others to do their jobs well. If they do it wrong, you give feedback and you let them do it again. So, it's how we learn. Do not do their work for them if they mess up. Just try and give them projects far enough in advance that if they do mess up, they can learn from it and try again. Now, problem two, the teens don't commit. I would say this is their favorite slide. This is their favorite slide. Teens don't commit. It was a quiet day when they did this. They had fun creating it too. Oh my goodness. They were so proud of the blur defect. So, you put all the effort into getting them cleared and then either they don't show or they come in and they do whatever minimum amount they need for their school credits and they stop coming even if they haven't met the time threshold that the library's volunteer program requires. So, how do we help teens commit to volunteering? So, in my area, a lot of the teens are required to earn community service hours or graduate or get into honors groups. So, side note, this volunteer, this board here, they made this board. It consists of all the teen programs that we had at the time before the physical shutdown. Anyway, so what does it matter if the teens think that their talents are being well used or if they aren't getting what they want out of the experience of all they really need is service credits? Well, it matters because the prime tenet of a volunteer program is this. Volunteers must be engaged to be retained. And that is true no matter what the age of the volunteer is. So, we want to fill our teen checklist with duties that let the volunteers have a positive impact on the library. Make sure they know the reasons behind what you're asking them to do. I have a shelf reading pep talk and it just brings them over to my belief that shelf reading is the most important job in the library and they get to do it. And that changes their entire demeanor towards making sure books are in order. Now, try to vary the projects you assign so a teen is not constantly doing the same thing. This can even be done by giving them a break from a long-term project to do something else. If the teens' interests don't match the library's needs, it is my pleasure to change that. I found it's actually because teens don't really know what libraries do. And that is true for a lot of adults too, as I'm sure many of us know. So, finally, acknowledge, support, and thank. Don't wait for National Volunteer Week to express your appreciation. Say thank you every time. Make a specific comment about what they did. And if you can, mention what will happen next time. If the teen is working on a long-term project, you follow through with them. Show your interest in the projects is important. Brag about them in front of other people, two other people. Our monthly meetings always start with individual and group acknowledgments of jobs well done. So, you can also be flexible within reason. Everyone starts with two hours per week. They get more accustomed to volunteering and require less guidance. They can have more freedom with their hours. So, that's a little giving back that we can do. I also have special programs for the volunteers as a way to thank them. We've done graphic novel drawing workshops and college readiness workshops with them, for example. And these are all by their request. So, problem three, the teens are you who loses motivation. This is self-explanatory. Even when it's something you love, there will be times when you don't want to. There are times when your teens will falter in their interest and dedication, and none of you will be putting your best foot forward. So, teens need to understand. Oh, okay. So, the concept of this picture, which again they made up themselves, is that the batteries are low. They have low batteries. Then along comes someone to say some encouragement to them. And now look here, their batteries are filled again. Nice. Yeah, yeah. I thought that was a good one. So, again, their idea. Yeah. We need that for each of our staff, not even teens. They're much more creative than I am, you know. So, teens need to understand why the things they're doing is important in the context of the library's role in the community. They, and then they need to be reminded of that. And when you remind them, you are also reminding yourself. So, help teens understand how the library works. Talk about command structure and different departments with them. If you can, invite the department heads to meetings, the teens can hear directly from them. Volunteer monthly reports, let the teens put their contributions into their own words. These reports let teens look back on what they've done. And I've also found them incredibly useful when someone, when one of the volunteers comes to me and says, hey, can you write a recommendation? I can look their past reports, see what they've done. Absolutely. I can write a recommendation. Communicate goals. And then give the teens ownership of them. Sometimes in our monthly meeting for active volunteers, I'll throw a question at them and then leave the room for 20 minutes and I'll come back and see what they've come up with. But sometimes they don't talk when the, when the grownup is in the room, they don't talk. But as soon as you leave, it's, you know, they talk. So, to find your motivation, take a moment to remember why you were doing this. So, I started this because I wanted to create something valuable for teens. I wanted some extra help. And I wanted to use my three years as a volunteer coordinator to create something worthwhile. Those are my, those are my, my noble reasons. I also have physical reasons, which are sometimes more motivating to me. Yes. I want to help teenagers develop into well-rounded, innovative, confident people. I also have a personal dislike of creating bulletin board displays. Now I have at least 15 teenagers who love doing it. And if that's not enough reason for having to volunteer program, I don't know what it is. Now I should say I also have a wonderful teen librarian now who also enjoys doing this. So it's not like as relevant to me now, but at the time when I was the teen librarian, I was overjoyed to have teenagers create displays for me. Now it takes time to develop a program like this. It is okay to give yourself a break. You know, you can pause new volunteer intake for a month. Now that everything's virtual, we're just kind of all trying to figure out what's, what's going on. You know, take it slowly, step by step. Everybody's just figuring out what the new, what the new rules are, what the new normal is. And lastly, talk to the volunteers. You might be surprised what projects they come up with to help you get your motivation back. So our big three takeaways. The most fruitful and long-term volunteer relationships occur. When the volunteer feels that their talents are being used well and when they feel valued. A successful teen volunteer program is a lot of work, but what you get out of it will be wonderful. And you will develop your leadership skills. You'll keep teens involved. You'll help them develop responsibility, independence, teamwork and innovation. You will be able to do more and you will see a positive impact on your library. So here they are, all of my volunteers. So my information is on the screen. Please do take it down. Please do contact me. I'm happy to talk to you. If you are on a committee that's related to teen volunteer programs, I want to know about it. I think the best thing we can all do is come together and share ideas and experiences. And thank you all very much. Yeah, all right. If there are any. Yeah. If anybody does have any questions or comments or questions about things that Amber has done or questions about things you have done that you might want some advice on or ideas for what you've done with your teens, your teen volunteers or your teen advisory groups. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you. Type into the questions section. We got a lot of time. You can do a lot of good conversation. One thing I was going to comment on when you were on. Oh, you can keep your slides up. Go ahead and keep it up. There's something in the screen. Yeah. I don't want to see in my face. Can you still have the screen? You should still be in the center. Okay. Yeah, I'm happy. So I'm happy just to share again. But now I've forgotten how. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But we don't want that. I was having a little seas attack earlier too. Screen. Screen. Hmm. We may not get to see that again. Anyway, they're questions will be trying to figure this out. Yeah. When you were on your, I think your signal last slide there about when, who. The teams like to do the bulletin boards. That's something great. Working, you know, using their strengths or their interests too, even if they're not yours. Or, you know, that's what we do with just library staff too. It's the same kind of thing. Extension of your staff. If you don't like doing something or it's just not your thing, you just find someone who is really into that and say, set them at it. Go for it. That's awesome. Oh yeah. Absolutely. And, you know, in some ways I am just messing around the screen here because I cannot figure it out. Okay. Let me do, and I'm going to do is. Okay. I'm going to bring back present your control to me. I can give you a new pop up. Oh, much better. Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah. Perfect. All right. Yeah. So if anybody wants me to go move back to a certain slide, I'm happy to do that. So that was just something that I thought was the screen, you know, they have their interests, the things that they would love to do that, you know, you may say, I just, it's not mine thing. I don't like it. It's the worst part of my job. But, you know, it's just like many staff other people love doing certain things that you don't. And, you know, the thing is when I was in my, you know, when I was in my twenties, I loved doing bulletin boards, but I'm not my twenties anymore. And now I do not love doing. I don't know. I don't know. I think, I think my interest moved more towards, you know, leadership developments. And, and, and, and away from bulletin boards. But, but, you know, I was bigger picture, but, you know, in a way. Making bulletin boards is like, it's a baby step towards leadership because you have ownership over that board. You can put whatever you want on it. So long as it matches some kind of theme, but you get to figure out how the theme is going to be, is going to be presented on the board. So, but I think, yeah, you know, now that I have more responsibilities, I don't need to express myself in that way. Thanks everyone. People, you know, evolve and go on to different things. Absolutely. Yeah. All right. We do have one question, one comment question. Thank you for the amazing presentation, or it says, and they just, I was, she did ask, and we'll, I think this, yes. Will you have slides available after the webinar? I can make slides available. Yeah. I can send it. I can send it. Yeah. If you want to get what we use, if the, if our presenters do are agreeable to it, we do include that when we put up the recording afterwards. So, Amber, if you want to send me like the sharing link to your Google slides, I can link to that. Yeah. Yeah. So, so, yeah, so, yes, we will have a link to the slides afterwards when the recording is posted and I'll let you guys all know when that recording is ready. So you will have access to all of that. And we do have some questions coming in. Great. So let's know, are you a multi-branch system? If yes, does your volunteer program encompass all of the branches? How is, you know, so maybe explain exactly how it works with the Queens public library and the different locations you guys have. Sure. Yes, we are. Queens public library is located, it's one of the boroughs of New York City. In New York City, there are three different library systems, completely separate systems. There's Queens, Brooklyn, and New York public. So Queens has, I believe, 65 branches. Queens Broughill is located in the, in the flushing part of Queens. So there's the flushing library, which is one of the main libraries. It's huge. And then Queens public, Queens Broughill is much smaller. The presentation that you saw today is strictly Queens Broughill. Since we have gone virtual, there is, there is now, I guess you would call it a centralized program. So even though a lot of my teens are still, are still involved, it's teens from, it's teens from all over Queens now. So I don't know if they answered the question or not. Yeah. Yeah. So this, this program strictly, this, this program was for my personal library, but now we're taking, getting these ideas and things and bringing it out. And it's interesting because now I'm working with the, with the people who, who are aware of this program, but we're kind of like, we created a teen advisory board in that, which I know a lot of libraries have and we're, we're having them, them do projects that are kind of working on promoting the library and stuff like that. They want to do like a newsletter and a podcast and a few other, and a few other kind of social media related things. So nothing has happened yet. We've had, we've had, I think like maybe three or four, three or four meetings, because it took us a while to kind of figure out how to do this, how to do this transition, but that's where people from other, from other branches are involved in where our volunteer, and where volunteer services is involved in the program coordinator. So did the other branches also have teen volunteers or. None of them have a program like this. Yeah, I actually, I actually done presentations within Queens public library on this program. None of them have a program like this and a lot of them, and when I was preparing this presentation, I sat down with a lot of them and said, what are your, what are your main issues? Let's take a look at these together. And I looked at my program and figured out how I'd kind of gotten around these issues. But no, this, this program is a, it's very organized and it's, it's very organized and it's very run by me, but I, but I, I tried to build it so that I can hand it off when, when the time comes. So I can hand it off to my teen librarian, you know, if she wants it. And I tried to build it. So as the teens get more experienced in the volunteering, that they can work somewhat autonomously. And that's also where I started the mentoring aspect of pairing the, the new volunteers with the more experienced volunteers, because that saves me time as well. Yeah. Absolutely. All right. And they are the one person that asked about these slides. I think you could definitely, or you could reach out to Amber here at her email too. She says, I'd love any information you have. I'm in charge of our branches, and I'm a teen volunteer program and I need all of the information. I think I talked about all the public library. More specific questions. I'm happy to have a conversation. Yeah. Yeah. And I'll mention it. Well, we're talking about that. And we had mentioned about the slides and everything and getting all this information. We are recording and the show, like I said, we posted up to the Nebraska library commission's YouTube channel. And when the recording is after this is done processing and I get it uploaded to YouTube. And I'll have the links from Amber for the slides. I'll send you guys all where the recording is available. And so that you can watch it again and get the slides. That should be done by the end of the week at the latest, probably tomorrow. I'll get it taken care of and everything you'll hear. You guys will hear from me that that's all ready for you guys to watch and have the slides and the information. Yeah. But definitely reach out to Amber with any more, any questions you want to know anything more detail. Yeah. I'm especially interested in knowing what, what other people are doing. And if there are no committees out there. That, that, that, that, that are working on this, on this kind of set. Yeah. We do have another question actually that came in. What other tasks do you have volunteers to complete virtually? More ideas about virtual things that people can do. Well, the volunteer services department. This is not something that I'm doing, but, but, um, it's gotten to least in the volunteer services department. They have gathered up a, a, a teen volunteers who post on social media for them. Like do little kind of influencer posts on social media about what the library is doing. Again, as I said, the tab meetings is, is relatively new. And, and so right now we're really just letting the teens brainstorm. Um, they want to do a podcast. So we're working on that with them. Uh, they wanted to do newsletters. They have, they have a lot of ideas about outreach to, outreach to schools, which ironically a lot of them, like the ideas we already do, but we're like, if you guys want to try, you go ahead. Um, uh, and, you know, and then talking about like an Instagram posts and what the best social media place would be. And they talk a lot about how to best represent the library. They talk a lot about what the library is to them and what the forward face of the library should be. Now, Queens library, it's a lot of libraries is large enough that we do have a marketing department and we do have an image in a brand. And so we talk, they have to work within that still. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So those kinds of things that can don't need big to be in the library is what they could be doing. Yeah. Um, and they can do book reviews. They can do book reviews too. And, um, we can, we can put them on the like Queens library blog and things and things like that. Or themselves or something. Absolutely. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Um, another question we, we have here, you know, these are all, this is volunteer program that you have. Um, and you were talking about this is something to get them understanding. One of the things, get them to understand what the library does, what it's all about. Cause some of them don't know at all. Um, so these are all volunteers. Do you guys do any sort of internship program with potentially paid internships or anything? Or do you guys strictly have, um, just volunteers at this level? Cause I did mention earlier that we have a similar things with you kids that are, um, working in the library that are, uh, underage, um, here in Nebraska, we have an internship program where we, um, help, we give grants to our libraries to hire, um, interns that can be anywhere from high school into college. Um, you know, sometimes they're adult interns, but we have many of them. Most of them interestingly do have teens do it. And its idea is to encourage them. Our main goal, if it ever happens and encourage them to become a librarian or work in the library in the end. Um, but do you guys do anything like that? Or is yours most strictly just the volunteers type? Well, there's a program over the summer that New York city runs called summer youth employment. And I think that started at age 14. And we have had, um, we, we have had participants in that come in, which is though, so that is paid. I don't know that we've ever called it an internship, but, uh, but they come in and they work, they work in the library and they do projects. They do projects for the, for the summer. And I'm not involved with it, but I think at our central branch, there have been youth services internships. I actually had, I actually had, um, someone asked me about it recently and we're not doing it now. Um, because I haven't figured out how to make it virtual, I suppose. Yeah. Yeah. Sorry. We had that difficulty this summer. We had just issued our internships. You know, they were normally we do them like in the fall for work that they're going to be doing in the spring or summer. A lot of them doing summer reading program related, um, activities and all of our internships were awarded. And they start gearing up to do them in the spring and then COVID shut everything down. Um, some of our internships, some of our libraries did tweak some of them to have more remote, um, you know, doing something different. And we just said, you know what, whatever you can get them to do, sure, you know, help with the curbside pickup or with the social media. You know, that wasn't what you're originally going to have to do, but that's fine. Um, we actually had to bump some of them. We actually, less than half, uh, they couldn't figure out a way to do it this year, but maybe next year they could because things may be better. So some of our 2020, uh, internship grants we have extended and said you can use them in 2021. We'll just bump you a year and try next year and maybe things will change enough. Um, that we'll be able to use them. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's happening with a lot of places where just, it's just on hold and just pick up where you left off, you know, in a year. Yeah. And things vary are very in different areas. Uh, some places, if there's not as much, uh, that may flare ups of the pandemic of the virus, then they can do more things in an area in the, in our cities or small towns where there's been more. They're like, no, we are totally locked down. Nobody's doing anything. So from community community here, you know, we support all the libraries in the state. Um, it can totally vary. Yeah. Yeah. You just work with what you can. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah. Um, alright. Anybody have any other questions, um, comments or anything you've been doing at your libraries that you want to share, uh, type in the question section. Um, we can get that information, you know, a chat with Anne about this. You know, one more way to, I just want to say, you know, just work with what you, work with what you can. I think that we, I think that, you know, what the pandemic has shown is really what libraries are, are capable of. Cause just the way the libraries have stepped up and converted into this virtual, virtual services and all the things that they've been able to do has, it's, it's been a test that I think that they have, uh, libraries have just met and, you know, they're both above and beyond. Maybe even, even they, maybe what they expected themselves to be able to do. So. Yeah. I know I, you know, yeah that pandemic page, there was an, uh, at the beginning, March, April, a lot of panic of deer in the headlights maybe of, uh-oh, no what, but a lot of these things, these resources, um, being able to do, um, you know, Facebook live videos or things in social media or YouTube or it was already there. It's just use it more. And I think what we're also learning is that like I mentioned this kind of in the beginning about how some of the virtual things you may have volunteers or interns do because because you have to be virtual right now doesn't have to stop you know after you still keep doing those and we have heard a lot of reports from libraries and from patrons and users of the libraries that they actually like all of the virtual things sometimes depending on their situation it's a better way for them to use the library than our traditional way parents who have kids that want to attend story time but I just don't have the time to drive my kid to the library at that time. I work from home or whoever's babysitting just can't take the kid there because of whatever situation but they could I could put them on the computer and they can still participate in story time with all their friends. That was a huge thing for that child to still be able to you know be able to do that I've never been able to bring them into the building because of anxiety issues that children have maybe or things social issues but now they can still participate and I think we're learning this is something we could have been doing all along and I think we should keep doing for all but that's a huge user base that we didn't have before and now absolutely you know you're getting people from all over the country now and even international for programs you know we had Queen of the Library had about a week where they're figuring things out and then it just it just took off. We have a gaming committee that has that had one's games multiple times and a week or a month and then I co-run a teen writing club that has members you know we don't know where and it's just it's you know it's addition to in addition to it being an advantage for the patrons it's also an advantage for the librarians because I'm able to collaborate now with other librarians from Queen's Public Library who I was never able to collaborate with before because we're at different branches but now it doesn't matter. Yeah we realized well we could have been doing this all along because we have all this technology being forced into it has made us realize it's easier. All right well it doesn't look well your chatting doesn't look anybody had any last minute desperate questions they wanted to ask that's great hopefully we got everyone's comments or questions covered. Yeah email me if you think anything else. Thanks we're getting close to the top of the hour so if you do have anything desperate you want to ask get it into the chat while I'm wrapping things up you're not a problem. As Amber said reach out to her you've got her contact information there she'd be happy to chat with you and she wants to hear what you're doing too so if you have any ideas or something you know like you just said you're collaborating with your Queen's Public Library colleagues but we can all collaborate all across the country. We have the technology. Yes absolutely and I'm gonna pull back the presenter control the my screen here again so that all right so we are recording as I said and the recording will be posted like I said probably sometime tomorrow you'll hear from me our archives are right here underneath our upcoming shows so I will send you a link and let you know that the archive is here most recent ones come up at the top of the page and you'll have a link to the recording and the slides. Amber will send me a link so we'll have that for you as well. While we're here I'll show you you can search our archives we do have our full archives here on the page so if you want to look for a particular topic see if we've talked about something about a certain library or certain something go ahead and search for this you can search our full archives are just the most recent 12 months that is because this is our full archives as I said since Encompass Live premiered which was in January 2009 so we have over 10 years worth I'm not going to scroll all the way down because that would be crazy but over 10 years worth of recordings here so do pay attention when you are watching a recording just check the original broadcast date they're all dated so you know when they first happened many of our topics will stand the test of time reading lists things like that but sometimes some things may become outdated information maybe old links won't work services or products may have changed drastically or don't even exist anymore but we are librarians we archive things we keep things for historical purposes and this is an easy thing for us to always keep up there as long as we have somewhere to host and have our recordings up they will be here okay so I'll send you that link information for recordings tomorrow but we do also have a Facebook page if you do like to use Facebook give us a like over there and you can keep up on what we're doing reminders a reminder about today's show information about our speakers previous shows so do if you do like to use Facebook you can do that we also use a hashtag you can see here and come live a little abbreviation here on Twitter and Instagram and I don't know wherever else our social media people are doing things now I can't remember everything but they're out there doing their our promotion as well so you can follow us there as well our next week show also be for about teens our annual best new teen reads this is one of 2020 Sally Snyder our coordinator children's and young adult library services here at the library commission every year she comes on and does a teen reads session so she's going to be doing that next week there is also a companion show to that the best new children's reads for 2020 that she does with one of our library staff here and one of our middle schools I believe and they're still working on a date for that so look for the children's version you know of this as well this will be specific for the teen and there'll be one for younger children coming up well we're booked up through December it'll be there in January or February so look for that so thanks for having me today it was really it was a pleasure yeah thanks so much I'm glad we were able to get here now I know there's a snow coming your way are you gonna be okay oh I'm looking yeah I'm looking forward to it I'm I'm home today but tomorrow I have tomorrow I do have to have to go into the go into the office well hopefully you'll be able to be positive yes good luck with that how's that wherever I am I will be working so it's true we can do that yeah um yeah so um yeah thank you so much I'm glad I was able to get you to come on talk about the teen volunteers this is you know we do a lot of things here about teens and children so I'm glad we're able to get you um I'm really glad I'm able to meet you and learn about the Nebraska library commission awesome it's great um one last thing I do want to give a uh promotion out about our big talk from small libraries is our annual online conference that I host here through the library commission it's our 10th annual big talk from small libraries will be at the end of February as always the last Friday in February and our call for speakers is open right now so if you are at a small library um for us small is um you serve a population of 10 000 or less and this would be public academic school whatever put in a presentation proposal and um maybe you can get to be on our conference here this is a national conference we do anyone we have speakers from across the country and attendees from across the country um so the call for speakers is open so submit something and I hope many will get you on our conference and then that thank you very much everyone for being with us this morning help we will see you on a future episode of Encompass Live. Bye bye.