Before an online audience
Pandemic prompts Grand Island library to create studio
GRAND ISLAND, Neb. — Grand Island Public Library now has its own digital media studio.
In response to the pandemic, the library forged an on-site studio to provide online programming to the community.
Through the library’s Facebook account and YouTube channel, patrons and viewers alike can share in children’s storytelling and community programs for adults.
Going online was a necessity at the start of the pandemic, in spring 2020, Library Director Celine Swan said.
“When covid hit, we started out with our virtual programs because our staff was all laid off. We had to rinky-dink together some programs,” Swan said. “We’ve had pretty good success with our virtual programming, but we had to kind of learn from the bottom up.”
Helping to lead that effort was library assistant Irasema Interiano, who has an education in multimedia communications.
Interiano called it “a big learning curve.”
“None of us knew how to do anything with cameras or video editing, or even copyright issues,” she said. “I started searching on Google on how to do things, and I keep learning things and learning new techniques. It just keeps going from there.”
Swan said the effort required much planning.
“We planned out what we wanted to do with our programs so we could keep kids invested in reading and literacy and help them out and support not only parents but teachers,” she said.
Online programming took off quickly, and the library’s audience continues to grow.
“There’s not as many people coming into the library but still we’re trying to get those people online,” Swan said. “We found that our numbers went way up with our virtual programs. We’ve had great attendance.”
Along with storytimes, the library’s has presented a puppeteer, a wildlife group and musical programs.
Offering these resources to the community was common before the pandemic.
“The library has always offered these types of services and nobody’s really known about it because we don’t have a social media or a marketing department,” Interiano said. “This pushed us into figuring out how important social media is.”
With virtual programming comes challenges, Swan said.
“It’s got to be a lot shorter because of the attention span of kids,” she said, “and also people are a lot busier so they like things that are fast.”
During the school year, the library has offered online programs for children who are toddler to preschool, for homeschooled children and programs for tweens to teens.
When school was out, the library offered online winter break programs every day.
For the upcoming spring break, a camping theme is planned for its online programs.
One worry is that kids aren’t reading as much because of the pandemic.
Just as there is a summer reading slide for students, there may be a covid slide, Swan said.
“Getting kids reading again is going to be the challenge as we get more people coming back into the library,” Swan said. “We want to do a mixture of programming for the summer.”
This summer, kids programs will be done online since those draw a large attendance.
For teens, there will be some in-person programs this summer with the library’s MakerSpace.
“Getting back to normal is a big challenge,” Swan said.
Grand Island Public Library may begin to relax its mask policy for people who have completed the vaccine, Swan said, and as more people return to the library, communal sitting space will be restored.
“There’s people who love to have their books in their hands. They’ll come in no matter what and say, ‘We can go without food but we can’t go without books.’”
Swan is proud of the library’s staff members for not only enduring through the pandemic, but for succeeding, as well.
“We closed for a little bit, but we rebounded. Through everything, we kept offering services for people and that’s good,” she said.
Interiano said building up the library’s digital studio has been fun.
“It’s not something I thought I would be doing,” she said. “I’ve definitely learned a lot of new things, and it’s a whole different experience.”
Swan said the library definitely will have an online presence going forward.
“There are people who maybe due to their lifestyle can’t come in or kids can’t come in, and it’s another good little market for the library to reach out to,” she said. “I’m looking forward to the day when we can have kids back here, but I think we’ll always do that little virtual programming.”
“When covid hit, we started out with our virtual programs because our staff was all laid off. We had to rinky-dink together some programs. We’ve had pretty good success with our virtual programming, but we had to kind of learn from the bottom up.”
— Library Director Celine Swan