President’s Program Creativity Counts: Nurturing Teens' Talents at Libraries Large and Small The 2009 YALSA President's Program will feature speakers who are sure to inspire the audience to engage teens' creative juices at their libraries. Whatever the medium, creativity can and should be nurtured and advocated by librarians who work with teens. This program will highlight the realistic potential of all types of libraries, both big and small.

1. Presented by Elise C. Cole
Teen Services Librarian
Oakville Public Library
ecole@oakville.ca

2.  Oakville, Ontario, Canada
– Located just outside of Toronto on Lake
Ontario
– Population of 165,613 (2006 Census)

3.  Number of youth (13-19) living in Oakville,
has grown 23% between 2001 and 2006
(just over 17,000)
 Youth account for over 10% of the
population!
 Library statistics indicate that 14% of all
registered library patrons are between the
ages of 12-19

4.  Our Kids Network Bulletin No. 4, 2007

5.  Teen Services at OPL: A Brief History
– Grew out of Youth Online (YO!)
– Fuelled by the numbers we saw earlier
– Increased focus on serving this age group in
Ontario
– Borrowers ages 12-19
 10,134 have borrowed items in the last three years
 13,714 have borrowed items in the past five years
(2008)

7. – Our Kids Network and Town of Oakville
studies
– Youth identified as an important sector and is
included in the Library’s Strategic and
Business Plans 2007-2011:
 “Staff will promote library services to the teen
audience by designing and presenting programs to
meet their unique needs”

8.  SWOT Analysis of Strategic Plan (2009) =
a Teen Services Business Plan
– Highlights:
 develop and implement a gaming strategy for all
branches
 develop a high calibre teen volunteer program
 increase and diversify teen workshop offerings
 deliver system-wide training to provide tips for
serving and advocating on behalf of teen patrons

9.  Teen Advisory Group (TAG) created in
2003
– TAG provided us with the input regarding their
desire to have a writing contest
– Teen Services asked to develop event for
Oakville Public Library Month
– Write To Express was born! (2005)

13.  How is this all organized?
– In Spring, TAG decides on photo or phrase for
theme
 For 2009, they chose to return to a photograph
– TAG Coordinator then selects about 40
photos for consideration
 Narrowed down to 7, and voting began!
– Marketing then creates posters
– Awards event speaker confirmed

14. http://www.flickr.com/creativecommons/

15.  Judges are contacted and asked to
participate
 Awards Event date, time and location are
set
 Judges packages are prepared
 Advertising materials sent out to schools,
put on website, posted in branches

16.  Contest closes
 Entries sent to Judges with judging
packages
 Postcards mailed to participants inviting
them to awards event
 RSVP list compiled
 TAG members volunteer for Awards event
– Set up, pick up food and flowers, MCs,
introductions of Judges and Guest Speaker

18.  Money Matters:
– Prizes are donated gift cards to Oakville Place
Mall
– Budget comes from Friends of the Oakville
Public Library
 2008: Received $2000 Spent: $803
 2007: Received $2000 Spent: $1274

19.  Planning a writing contest or need other
program ideas?
– YALSA, Blog and Mailing lists
 http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/yalsa/yalsa.cfm
 http://yalsa.ala.org/blog/
 http://www.ala.org/ala/mgrps/divs/yalsa/electronicr
esourcesb/websitesmailing.cfm esp YA-YAAC
– Google News/Blog alert for Teen programs
 http://news.google.com/ and click on News Alerts

20.  More ideas….
– PUBYAC
 http://www.pubyac.org/
– SLJTeen (School Library Journal)
 Subscribe @
https://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/subscribe.asp?screen=
nl1
– Voice of Youth Advocates (VOYA)
 http://www.voya.com/
– Conferences, of course!
 http://presentations.ala.org
 http://www.accessola.com/superconference2009/
 http://www.cla.ca/conference/2009/index.htm

21. Slides will be available at:
http://presentations.ala.org
Or, contact me at ecole@oakville.ca