Synchronicity

Ever notice how events or ideas cluster? You hear about something and start to notice it everywhere? Sometimes it's a new idea or concept and sometimes it's a concept you've used in the past and haven't even thought about for a long time.

That happened to me this week. Tuesday I attended a meeting to unveil the Charleston Youth Master Plan Initiative. The City of Charleston was selected to participate in the National League of Cities MetLife Foundation City-Schools Youth Planning Initiative in the fall of 2005. They developed a team, including Pam Cadden for CCPL, and embarked upon an 18 month process to research youth development, and led numerous sessions to illicit feedback from the community on the life and needs of youth in our community. The meeting announced to numerous community agencies and leaders that our involvement was needed to develop and implement a plan from the information they've gathered, in order to improve the lives of youth in Charleston county.

Yesterday Jim Letendre and I went to the State Library to attend the Community Analysis Workshop for Public Libraries , led by Jo Haight Sarling from Denver Public Library and Debra Van Tasset, from Louisville (Colorado) Public Library. They walked us through a particular process of community analysis and shared their successes with the process.

Both the workshop and the Youth Master Plan meeting shared this: we need to hear from communities and from the individuals in the communities what their lives are like, what their dreams are, what they want and need, before deciding what services should be offered. Makes sense, of course, but it's hard for us to take the time to research intensively before acting. Librarians want to help and it's our nature to jump right in to offer what we think will meet the needs that we see. Lesson for the week is to ask first!