Content area
Full text
A joint use school/public library is like a living room in a multi-generational family home, bringing together all ages from toddlers to retirees. During a typical week in a joint-use library in Texas, preschoolers gather in eager anticipation for story time - seated in a semicircle, their bright upturned faces burst into laughter while listening to Ladybug Girl's latest predicament or hearing Pete the Cat optimistically remind us that, "It's all good." Proving that it is never too late to learn, senior library patrons sit at desktop computers. Their class focuses on mastering basic computer skills necessary to adapt in our ever-changing digital world. Students and faculty from the local school come and go, gravitating to the library to check out material, use the Internet, or just visit with friends and browse their electronic devices. In a combined library, grandparents share sitting areas with teens studying or playing card games while adults fill out job applications online. In this living room of learning, there is space for all and everyone is welcome.
Joint-use libraries are most often public libraries combined with school library media centers. They have existed in the United States and internationally for more than a century. A joint-use library is defined as "a library in which two or more distinct library service providers serve their client groups in the same building, based on an agreement that specifies the relationship between the providers (Bundy, 2003)."
While professional opinions from scholarly articles and books alternately support and criticize elements of dual use libraries, research suggests certain critical success factors for combined library services:
* A formal joint use agreement
* One library director responsible for both school and public library services
* Stakeholder support from...