FALL 2018
VOLUME 8 • ISSUE 1
OFF the SHELF A MAGAZINE FROM THE FREE LIBRARY OF PHILADELPHIA
A Decade of Transformation President and Director Siobhan A. Reardon Marks 10 Years Leading the Library
ALSO INSIDE: DIVISION OF CULTURAL AND CIVIC ENGAGEMENT PLAY-AND-LEARN SPACES COME TO NEIGHBORHOOD LIBRARIES THE FINAL WORD WITH JILL LEPORE
The Free Library Fund ensures that Philadelphians of all ages have access to the books and programs that excite them the most.
SUPPORT THE FREE LIBRARY FUND TODAY! freelibrary.org/give
FROM THE CHAIRS OF THE BOARDS
FREE LIBRARY OF PHILADELPHIA PRESIDENT AND DIRECTOR
Siobhan A. Reardon
DEPUTY DIRECTOR OF CUSTOMER ENGAGEMENT
Joe Benford
VICE PRESIDENT OF DEVELOPMENT
Shara Pollie
VICE PRESIDENT OF EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
Sandra Horrocks
ASSOCIATE VICE PRESIDENT OF EXTERNAL AFFAIRS
Alix Gerz
DIRECTOR OF COMMUNICATIONS AND MARKETING
Christine Miller
SENIOR WRITER AND EDITOR
Matt Singer
COMMUNICATIONS AND PRODUCTION COORDINATOR
Labonno Islam
CONTRIBUTING WRITERS
Julie Berger Jennifer Donsky
CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS
Kelly & Massa (cover, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 11) Mike Savidge of Savidge Media (5) Ryan Brandenberg (2, 7, 9, 10, 11) Sean Diserio (5) Philadelphia International Airport (5) Jules Vuotto (7) Halkin Mason Photography (12, 13) Curt Hudson (back cover) FREE LIBRARY OF PHILADELPHIA FOUNDATION
1901 Vine Street, Suite 111 Philadelphia, PA 19103 215-567-7710 freelibrary.org/support OFF THE SHELF
offtheshelf@freelibrary.org freelibrary.org/publications Off the Shelf is published twice annually for supporters of the Free Library of Philadelphia and showcases the Library’s educational, economic, and cultural contributions to the region.
ON THE COVER: BUILDING SPACES FOR LITERACY, LEARNING, AND INSPIRATION THAT ARE FIT TO A T—AND T-SQUARE! FREE LIBRARY PRESIDENT AND DIRECTOR SIOBHAN A. REARDON SURVEYS THE DRAMATIC PROGRESS IN CREATING LIVELY, TECHNOLOGICALLY ADVANCED, AND HANDSOME NEW SPACES IN THE PARKWAY CENTRAL LIBRARY.
Welcome to this special edition of Off the Shelf, honoring Free Library President and Director Siobhan A. Reardon. This fall marks her 10th year at the Free Library’s helm. What a transformative decade it has been for the Library! Under Siobhan’s leadership, the Library has become one of the most respected, fast-moving institutions in the city and is recognized as outstanding among libraries nationwide. At a time when it was commonly thought that libraries were becoming passé in the digital age, she grasped immediately the need for libraries to make massive changes in order to meet the need and demand for new and expanded services in the 21st century. Amid cuts to the Library’s budget, Siobhan wisely and creatively transformed the inner workings of the Library to achieve greater flexibility, interaction, and cross-library support. She engages the community in new ways, including innovative programs like the Culinary Literacy Center and Prison and Re-entry Services. Drawing on community partnerships and conversations, she spearheaded the renovation of five pilot neighborhood libraries into true 21st Century Libraries, vastly increasing community use. And she guided vital updates to the historic Parkway Central Library, which will soon open soaring new public spaces. Siobhan’s vision received national recognition in 2015 when she was named Librarian of Year by Library Journal. Perhaps more significantly, she won the support of critical private and public funders at a time when doing so became increasingly difficult. Most of all, she is a delight of candor, humor, and indefatigable, can-do spirit that infects all of us on the Library’s boards, its staff, and in the communities she serves. In the pages ahead you’ll read about how Siobhan’s vision led to the development of the Division of Cultural and Civic Engagement, which aims to enhance existing Library programs and create innovative new ones for adults across the city, and—inspired by research demonstrating the importance of play as a learning tool—the design and installation of new Play-and-Learn spaces both inside and outside neighborhood libraries. Siobhan’s brilliance, integrity, talent, and inclusiveness have brought so much to our city; we are incredibly fortunate to have her in Philadelphia. Please join us in wishing her hardy congratulations on this milestone and in saying a heartfelt thank you for her service. With gratitude
Barbara Sutherland CHAIR, BOARD OF DIRECTORS
Pamela Dembe CHAIR, BOARD OF TRUSTEES
WHAT’S INSIDE 4 6 7 8 12 14 15
NEWS AND NOTES FROM THE SPECIAL COLLECTIONS—FIGHTING FOR VOTING RIGHTS AND VOTING WELL: W. E. B. DU BOIS IN THE “JOURNAL OF THE COLOR LINE” FOCUS ON: THE DIVISION OF CULTURAL AND CIVIC ENGAGEMENT A DECADE OF TRANSFORMATION: PRESIDENT AND DIRECTOR SIOBHAN A. REARDON MARKS 10 YEARS LEADING THE LIBRARY FROM THE NEIGHBORHOODS: PLAY-AND-LEARN SPACES COME TO NEIGHBORHOOD LIBRARIES THE FINAL WORD: JILL LEPORE BOARDS OF THE FREE LIBRARY
ANNOUNCING THE
FEATURED SELECTION We are excited to announce that the 2019 One Book, One Philadelphia featured selection is Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward. This haunted American road novel is a journey through Mississippi’s past and present and a staggering tale of loss and survival. Following one family as they make the fraught trip from their Gulf Coast town to the Mississippi State Penitentiary, Sing, Unburied, Sing pays witness to the strength of emotional bonds, the violent pull of our collective history, and the meaning of healing. Jesmyn Ward is the first woman and first African American author to receive two National Book Awards—in 2011 for Salvage the Bones (set in the chaos and aftermath of Hurricane Katrina) and in 2017 for Sing, Unburied, Sing. Men We Reaped— Ward’s exploration of the racism and economic struggles faced by African Americans in her hometown and its loss of five young men in five years—is the 2019 One Book adult companion title. Young readers will join the conversation with youth companion titles, including Ghost Boys by Jewell Parker Rhodes and Last Stop on Market Street by Matt de la Peña.
PLEASE JOIN US ON JANUARY 16, 2019 FOR A KICKOFF CELEBRATION FEATURING JESMYN WARD IN PARKWAY CENTRAL LIBRARY’S MONTGOMERY AUDITORIUM AT 7:30 P.M. IN THE MEANTIME, LET’S READ!
NEW STAFF We are pleased to welcome this addition to our executive team. SHARA POLLIE joined the Free Library executive team as Vice President of Development. In this role, she manages an impressive fundraising department at the Free Library Foundation and leads the Development office in providing financial resources for systemwide programs and services. Shara and the fundraising department support the Library’s Building Inspiration: 21st Century Libraries Initiative. Shara has more than 15 years of experience in development work in the Philadelphia area and is well-versed in gathering philanthropic support for education and the arts.
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AROUND THE SYSTEM 1 Our Read to a Dog program allows children to associate positive experiences with reading. These dogs help provide a comfortable environment for students to practice their reading skills in a non-judgmental space.
3 Short Story Dispensers deliver tales-to-go with the push of a button at the South Philadelphia Library, the Department of Human Services, and—shown here—Philadelphia International Airport, where PHL CEO Chellie Cameron (right) sampled fresh literary gems with Free Library President and Director Siobhan A. Reardon.
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A NEW SPACE WITH A CRUCIAL CIVIC MISSION: The Robert and Eileen Kennedy Heim Center for Cultural and Civic Engagement In early 2019, a dynamic new space in the Parkway Central Library will welcome Philadelphians to gather and discuss, learn, plan, and collaborate in shaping a shared future of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” We are especially excited and deeply grateful to announce that this forum for civic engagement will be named in honor of a generous gift from Robert C. and Eileen Kennedy Heim. Physically, The Robert and Eileen Kennedy Heim Center for Cultural and Civic Engagement will be an open and expansive 8,000-square-foot atrium fitted for comfortable, relaxed, face-to-face interaction while providing the technological resources that connect program participants here with individuals and groups in libraries and other gathering venues across the country. In concept and lived experience, The Heim Center will be a venue for passionate engagement and interaction, intellectual discourse, and grassroots problem solving. Its potential for open-ended, informal, spontaneous use by visitors will be activated by public programs planned and presented by members of the community and augmented by programs offered by the innovative professional staff of the Library’s Division of Cultural and Civic Engagement. Eileen Kennedy Heim and Robert C. Heim have devoted countless hours of service to the Free Library of Philadelphia and The Rosenbach. Bob has served on the Free Library’s Board of Trustees since 2005—serving as Chair from 2008 to 2015—and has served on the Library Foundation’s Board of Directors since 2007. Eileen is a longstanding member of The Rosenbach’s Board of Directors. Both are longtime contributors to the Free Library and devoted advocates for literacy and civic engagement.
“The public library exemplifies what our democracy is about. Traditionally devoted to learning and accessible to all, its mission today also includes the free exchange of ideas through civil discourse. The library is the America we believe in.”—Robert Heim The Robert and Eileen Kennedy Heim Center for Cultural and Civic Engagement will open with other renovated and reimagined spaces in Parkway Central Library—including the Business Resource and Innovation Center and the Marie and Joseph Field Teen Center—next spring.
• • • BY MATT SINGER
2 The Logan Library hosted a fashion show featuring local designers and models.
• • • BY MATT SINGER
FROM THE SPECIAL COLLECTIONS
Fighting for Voting Rights and Voting Well: W. E. B. Du Bois in the “Journal of the Color Line” Born in 1868, just shortly after the Union’s triumph in the Civil War and the emancipation of enslaved African Americans, William Edward Burghardt (W. E. B.) Du Bois died in 1963, just one year before Congress passed the Civil Rights Act, which— in law if not practice—ended discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin.
Freeman H. M. Murray, and Lafayette N. Henshaw from 1907 to 1910. The 31 issues of The Horizon varied in length from 12 to 25 pages. In addition to Du Bois’s opinion-pieces, The Horizon focused on press coverage relating to African Americans, often decrying racism in the “mainstream” (i.e., white) media and accommodation and appeasement in black-owned periodicals.
An activist, sociologist, author, publisher, educator, and speaker, Du Bois fought hands-on for black equality, shaped and raised awareness of unfolding events, and identified and communicated matters of long-term, overarching significance. Du Bois was both a contemporary and successor to Frederick Douglass (1818–1895), the trailblazing public advocate for African American freedom and equality. Gifted writers and orators, Douglass and Du Bois reached national audiences through books and magazines, photographs, and the press. This wealth of historical evidence and the continued relevance of Douglass and Du Bois is the inspiration for the special exhibition At These Crossroads: The Lives and Legacies of Frederick Douglass and W. E. B. Du Bois. At These Crossroads will open later this fall in the West Gallery at the Parkway Central Library. The exhibition marks the bicentennial and sesquicentennial, respectively, of Douglass and Du Bois’s births. To illustrate the changing realities of Douglass and Du Bois’s lives and their continued relevance, exhibition curator Dr. Judith Giesberg—professor of history at Villanova University—points to The Horizon, the “Journal of The Color Line” written and edited by Du Bois,
In a July 1908 editorial, Du Bois argued that “the policy of the Democratic Party is the best policy for the Negro” and urged African Americans to end their historic allegiance to the Republican Party. Although once the party of Abraham Lincoln, emancipation, and Douglass, Giesberg notes, “In 1908, the Republican Party was the party of white supremacy. Du Bois insisted that African Americans owe their allegiance to no party and, instead, should cast their vote for candidates who deliver on promises of black economic prosperity and political equality.” “Our goal with At These Crossroads, as with all the Free Library’s exhibitions, is to use our collections to inspire civic dialogue,” explains Andrew Nurkin, the Free Library’s Deputy Director for Enrichment and Civic Engagement. “The Horizon—which can be found in a rare full run at the Free Library—helps us understand the context of 1908 and challenges us to consider voter disenfranchisement, racial inequality, and economic disparity in 2018.”
TOP: THE HORIZON, JULY 1908. COURTESY OF THE RARE BOOK DEPARTMENT. BOTTOM: FORMAL PHOTOGRAPH OF W. E. B. DU BOIS, WITH BEARD AND MUSTACHE, AROUND 50 YEARS OLD (CA. 1915), CORNELIUS MARION (C. M.) BATTEY. COURTESY OF THE LIBRARY OF CONGRESS.
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Kalela Williams, Director of Neighborhood Library Enrichment Programming, brings a personal, 21st-century perspective to what Du Bois described as “double-consciousness”— African Americans’ constant awareness of being, simultaneously, black and American. “At These Crossroads is as much about being black in the 21st century as the 19th or 20th,” Williams observes. “It’s about the confluence of blackness and patriotism. For me, it’s what it means to celebrate both African heritage and American citizenship.”
• • • BY JULIE BERGER
FOCUS ON
PHILADELPHIA POET LAUREATE RAQUEL SALAS RIVERA
DIVISION OF CULTURAL AND CIVIC ENGAGEMENT
2018 ONE BOOK, ONE PHILADELPHIA AUTHOR JACQUELINE WOODSON
YOUTH POET LAUREATE WES MATTHEWS
THE FREE LIBRARY WAS FOUNDED WITH THE GOAL OF SUPPORTING PHILADELPHIANS IN THEIR EFFORTS TO ACHIEVE PERSONAL ENLIGHTENMENT, AND THE LIBRARY HAS CONTINUOUSLY EVOLVED TO REACH THIS GOAL IN AN EVER-CHANGING CITY AND WORLD. TO FURTHER THIS, THE LIBRARY HAS CREATED THE DIVISION OF CULTURAL AND CIVIC ENGAGEMENT, A NEW OFFICE THAT AIMS TO ENRICH THE PUBLIC LIFE OF PHILADELPHIA THROUGH CULTURAL ENGAGEMENT, CIVIC DIALOGUE, AND THE FREE EXCHANGE OF IDEAS. Helmed by Andrew Nurkin, Deputy Director for Enrichment and Civic Engagement, the Division of Cultural and Civic Engagement encompasses existing library programs—including the renowned Author Event Series, programming at The Rosenbach, and offerings at the Parkway Central Library— seeks to expand their reach and scope, and serves as a springboard for new programs and initiatives. This new discussion has a particular focus on initiating more civic programming in our neighborhood libraries, offering adults in every community as many opportunities for enrichment and advancement as we have steadfastly provided for our city’s children. Through concerts and performances, exhibitions for new audiences, classes, reading groups, artistic workshops, and more, the Division seeks to build a sense of community engagement at a very local level. In addition to expanding current programs at Parkway Central and neighborhood libraries, the Division will create exciting new opportunities for informal civic-minded interaction and present special programs in the new Robert and Eileen Kennedy Heim Center for Cultural and Civic Engagement, which is set to open Spring 2019 in the Parkway Central Library (see page 5). “We want Philadelphians to be inspired by art, literature, and culture when they walk into their neighborhood library, as well
as to be in dialogue with people of different perspectives,” says Nurkin. “By sparking their curiosity, they will hopefully be inspired to learn more, ask more questions, and then share their vision for our city, state, and country.” Community conversations are at the heart of this work. Tapping into issues that affect the immediate neighborhood, Ramonita G. de Rodriguez Library has brought stakeholders together for conversations about gentrification. Drawing on the energy of the Author Events Series at Parkway Central, the new Authors Up Close program brings local and regional authors to neighborhood libraries for salon-style conversations. The Rosenbach’s In Conversation With series also offers audiences a chance to share thoughts and questions with literary and cultural luminaries. Programs like these, as well as the city’s Poet and Youth Laureate program—which is now run out of this office—forge bonds and promote lifelong learning. The center is also committed to creating and supporting programs that empower Philadelphians, like the Library’s offerings for new Americans and its Prison and Re-entry Services. In a time when many in our community are seeking to become more civically engaged, the Library is working to create more access to library and social services, non-partisan political information, and civic resources for all Philadelphians.
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A DECADE OF TRANSFORMATION:
President and Director Siobhan A. Reardon Marks 10 Years Leading the Free Library Siobhan A. Reardon began her transformational tenure as President and Director of the Free Library of Philadelphia in 2008, bringing with her comprehensive knowledge and experience in the arts, sciences, and practicalities of directing major metropolitan libraries. She came equipped, as well, with a clear and ambitious vision for a vanguard, 21st-century Library that met current and anticipated future needs, and strove to reach beyond them to realize the dreams of our city and its people. Confronted immediately by unprecedented challenges created by the stock-market crash of 2008 and ensuing Great Recession, Siobhan led the Library back from the brink and proceeded to transform it into a forwardthinking, community-centered, and life-changing institution. She succeeded in reimagining and reshaping the Free Library, but does not consider the process complete. Siobhan works tirelessly to ensure that Philadelphia’s Library is a center for curiosity, enlightenment, technological access, and community support for everyone.
We are delighted to share Siobhan’s own words on the opportunities, challenges, joys, and surprises she’s encountered at the Free Library as she builds on the institution’s momentum and stands poised to open exciting new spaces in the Parkway Central Library in the year ahead. {8}
Take us back to when you first arrived at the Free Library. What did the landscape look like in 2008?
The economy tanked just two weeks after I arrived at the Free Library. As a result, all the things that I thought I was going be able to do—because the Library had at that time a much better budget than it does now—didn’t come to pass. I focused on not crying over spilled milk, and instead showing that the Library could and would remain a really strong organization. It was an extraordinarily chaotic time. We were faced with nearly $12 million worth of budget cuts from both the City of Philadelphia as well as the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. I spent the first three years of my tenure just dealing with the budget and facing the reality that we could no longer operate the way we had before 2008. We had to figure out how to pivot into a new reality. This led to the process of strategic planning, and defining the right course for us to take.
Did you have immediate goals in mind, projects you wanted to tackle? You spend your first bit of time in any new job just learning how the organization ticks, and I was proud of the fact that I visited every one of the 54 neighborhood libraries within three months. That was an imperative for making decisions about staffing and materials.
Fortunately for us, during this chaotic period of time, the Free Library Foundation stepped up to assist generous individuals in finding ways to support the Library. That was unique to us. People really went that extra mile to fill the gap that the city and other public entities couldn’t. And so you had an extraordinarily important outpouring of private resources that allowed us to keep things going—for instance, Literacy Enrichment Afterschool Program (LEAP) moved from being entirely funded by the City to receiving more private support during that period.
Another piece of the process was understanding what the community expected. The reaction was visceral and profound when we said we were going to close a number of neighborhood libraries in the wake of the economic downturn. What became apparent was that this was a city of neighborhoods and the library is the most, and sometimes the only, important civic resource in many communities. There are a couple of programs that began orienting us with regard to these expectations: Hot Spots and the Words at Play Vocabulary Initiative, which are both hyperlocal, collective-impact programs. Both were key to us understanding how important it was to step outside of the “safety zone” of the Library’s buildings and into other places and spaces to understand what was really going on in a community.
We also had to learn to staff more efficiently. Our spaces must always be clean and safe, a librarian must be on hand, and you need support staff to manage the collection and frontend interaction. This is how we developed the preference for a “four-person opening” when we are able. Our City-provided resources have improved in the years since. We recovered some of the public funding and streamlined some personnel expenses. The Rebuild initiative will also bring much needed capital resources to our neighborhood libraries. However, our materials budget remains woefully inadequate.
With Hot Spots, in particular, we learned that there were thousands who had never crossed the transom of a library because they thought they had to be literate to enter. This finding had a lot to do with how we designed our five newly reopened 21st Century Libraries. The Library has to be seen as open and accessible; it can’t feel intimidating. At the same time, our outreach had to change. We had to meet people where they are to earn their trust. Remember, during this time Philadelphia had an uptick of immigrants, and the idea that a government entity can be trusted was a new one to many. This made our work a matter of day-by-day engagement—that open door, that accessible library that says “this place belongs to you.”
We developed an ongoing focus to engage the staff strategically and in a much deeper, more visceral way; to move from being told what to do to deciding what to do in their communities. In this period we added new positions for social workers, community organizers, and digital resource specialists. Their support defined how we reach out to the community and become increasingly more open and accessible.
Yet another piece of the transformation was understanding that libraries are about people, not stuff. Too often we talk about our resources and not about the individual that’s coming to access those resources. We’ve become much more focused on how to provide that someone with the resources they need.
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What will be your focus in the years ahead?
I think we have to continue to double down on family literacy by working tirelessly to ensure that all children are reading on grade level. I’m going to keep rattling that cage. It’s hard work and it takes a village to get it done. And we must really understand that the child isn’t going to do it by him or herself and that the environments in which these children learn—whether it’s at home or a library or a school—all have to be able to come together better in order to be more supportive over the long term. We will focus on our civic engagement through the Division of Cultural and Civic Engagement, which provides a center of activity for really opening the library up to be a safe space for important conversations, be they facilitated or ad hoc.
Looking back on the last 10 years, what achievements are you most proud of?
I really love the fact that we came through a traumatic time as a better, tighter organization. I’m super proud of the fact that our Foundation really stepped up to the plate. People came to understand that this is an organization that you should contribute to because your dollars will create and support impactful programs. I’m enormously proud of our 21st Century Libraries programs and moving forward on the renovation and expansion of Parkway Central. I’m proud of our boards and the many kinds of diversity they contain. I’m proud of our staff—they’ve been through a lot of change and worked through really difficult issues. I love the fact that many of them have taken on this sense of joie de vivre and spread their wings—this means making a mistake sometimes, but always keeping at it. I’m proud that we created and opened the Culinary Literacy Center—it’s the best maker space on the planet and the approach is now being extended to neighborhood libraries with the support of City Council. I love our New Revenue Initiatives and trying to earn money in creative ways. Government Affairs wasn’t a function when I came to the Free Library and is now, as is Strategic Initiatives. And, we’ve taken on the responsibility of the Read by 4th campaign. We’ve done so much in this period that really transformed the ways the Library works and how it serves—and even anticipates—the needs of the people of Philadelphia.
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We will work to continuously improve access to Library resources, including access for alternative learners— people who don’t have or who come to learning through auditory or visual means—and ensure that access is better honed by truly understanding the individual in front of us. And we will continue our work on career support. While there are a lot of people out of work, there are also plenty of jobs in this city. We must determine why unemployment persists in Philadelphia. Thirtytwo percent of those who use the Library’s job-search programs and resources find a job. What can we do to keep growing that number?
What do you see as the role of the Free Library—or any public library—in the 21st century?
As a profession, we’ve all come to understand that our work is about people, that we have to get away from books and “the stuff” to become a customer-oriented access profession. It’s been thrilling to watch this evolve, and to see this change take place world-wide. This change is acute for public libraries. It is a real pivot to think about libraries primarily in regard to the people who come through the door. Now, everything supports that individual and those reasons. We really need to continue our focus on communities, the way we did when we began our cluster model of service. It’s about thinking through the question of how a library can become and continue to be the glue in a community—the connector that people know they can turn to for the information and learning support they need or want. We can make the Free Library a hub and anchor by connecting and working in partnership with schools, police, the fire department and other emergency services, faithbased organizations, and entrepreneurs.
What has surprised you the most about the Free Library? Philadelphia?
I came from the Brooklyn Public Library, and Brooklyn is a borough of neighborhoods. So I understood the idea of Philadelphia being a city of neighborhoods. But what surprised me was how intensely aligned the public is with those very specific neighborhoods and that the public doesn’t always travel easily from one neighborhood to another. Philadelphians are so personally and proudly aligned with their immediate communities. It’s intriguing! Philadelphia is a big small city, and there’s a beauty to that. You get to know people in this city and what makes them tick pretty quickly, which is a great benefit of Philadelphia being small in some ways. On the other side of it, Philadelphia is, ultimately, a big city and we have big city problems. You can’t ignore the fact that 50% of the city’s employment base is functionally illiterate. Who should own the responsibility for addressing and correcting that? Somebody has to do something. The Library committed itself to taking on this challenge by focusing our efforts on building literacy among children from their pre-school years through fourth-grade. Watching the growth of this city has also been surprising—its entrepreneurs, new citizens, the power of our universities, the healthcare enterprise. Many of the keys to Philadelphia’s long-term growth and sustainability can be found in these individuals, groups, organizations, and corporations.
What is your favorite way to interact with a library?
There isn’t a city I have visited where I haven’t looked to find the local library because I want to see what everybody is doing—and figure out how to rob a good idea! I love seeing how libraries worldwide interact with their communities. I tend to like to be a little anonymous and independent when I walk in a new space and through its shelves.
To you, the Free Library of Philadelphia is also the Free Library of _________(Fill in the blank.) Why?
The Free Library of Promise, because we’re all about building a better you. It’s about the promise of our engagement with you and your engagement with us. And it’s about the promise that, together, we can create an organization and a city that are thriving.
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from the
NEIGHBORHOODS
PLAY-AND-LEARN SPACES COME TO NEIGHBORHOOD LIBRARIES A library used to be, first and foremost, a quiet place for reading. Whether books, newspapers, or periodicals, the pursuit was usually solitary and near silence was always encouraged. Though the “shushing” librarian with her hair (yes, nearly always a woman) in a tight bun and spectacles upon the bridge of her nose is still prevalent as a representation of the profession, it does not reflect the contemporary reality of the Free Library of Philadelphia.
Why not? Well, because PLAY is having its moment. Play within libraries. Play encouraged by librarians. Play spaces designed with libraries in mind! Do not fear that we have strayed from our mission to advance literacy, guide learning, or inspire curiosity. Rather, we are keeping abreast of the latest research and using its conclusions to direct the enactment of our mission and the enhancement of our objectives. For research now shows that children learn best—and first—through play: through pretending, creating, interacting, and moving. With this understanding—and with funding from the William Penn Foundation, plus additional support from the Knight Foundation—the Free Library has re-envisioned how our spaces for children can maximize learning. Thus, behold our vibrant new Play-and-Learn Spaces at Cecil B. Moore, Whitman, and Wyoming libraries. Though varying in appearance and with differences in attributes, all three spaces have transformed their respective children’s areas into dynamic learning landscapes that promote motor skills, language development, and literacy.
WYOMING LIBRARY
CECIL B. MOORE LIBRARY
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WHITMAN LIBRARY
STAFF SPOTLIGHT: KAYLA HOSKINSON, CHILDREN’S LIBRARIAN, CECIL B. MOORE LIBRARY As Samuel Perduta, Children’s Librarian, Wyoming Library notes,
How did you get started working for the Free Library? While I was finishing my master’s program in Library Science, I volunteered at the Teen Center at the Parkway Central Library. After more than four years in an academic library, I knew I wanted to make the switch to public libraries and youth services. Around the same time, the librarian test opened up and I was excited to apply!
“Kids immediately gravitate towards the space. I also observe more collaboration and sharing as they build forts, castles, and other cool structures.” Lest you think that all the learning fun is reserved for children, Samuel also comments, “We’ve seen more parents playing and interacting with their younger kids, something we didn’t see as much without the dedicated space.”
What do you enjoy most about your current role as Children’s Librarian? I love being able to witness the different ways youth learn and grow while in the library. They constantly surprise and impress us. The community around Cecil B. Moore (CBM) is tight-knit; the youth we serve in the children’s section range in age from 4 to 16. Through the hard work of everyone at CBM, we’ve been able to make a space where youth of all ages feel safe, supported, and inspired to create and learn.
Whitman Library’s Rachel Solomon agrees. “I’ve observed families cuddling up with a book and reading together.” She adds, “The designs’ bright colors have brought cheeriness to our children’s area and symbolize the wonder and excitement kids express when they come to the library.”
How has CBM’s Play-and-Learn Space impacted the community? CBM’s new space gives customers the opportunity to engage in all levels of play and learning, from resting in a reading nook to climbing a 10 foot wall. The installation of the climbing wall has encouraged youth to take risks in all aspects of their education in the library. They recognize, also, that with it they can redirect their energy by taking ‘brain breaks’ from their homework so they can return to it more focused. Many parents have reacted positively to the space, and we have seen more families come to CBM after reading about the climbing wall in the press. We recognize, though, that it will take a lot of work to show the value of spaces like this to the rest of the community; our goal is to show that this adds to CBM, not detracts.
These literacy-rich playscapes are expressly designed to provide children with the building blocks to form and grow the preliteracy skills they need to become school-ready. With climbing walls, perching towers, nooks and tunnels, magnetic surfaces with large letter magnets, and reading alcoves inside shelving units, the spaces encourage both active play and quiet reading and reflection. And they are wholly unlike other spaces neighborhood children encounter. With the guidance of community input, they were designed by architecture firm Digsau and Studio Ludo, a play-focused nonprofit, and outfitted with materials fabricated by Erector Sets, Inc. Staff from Smith Playground have trained key library personnel in how to best use these spaces to promote free play and learning. In the coming months, Digsau and Studio Ludo will also be installing outdoor spaces at Cecil B. Moore Library and at Kingsessing Library in Southwest Philadelphia.
If you could have lunch with any author living or dead, who would it be and why? James Joyce, because of his weird, weird brain.
So come on over and play and learn with us! • • • BY JENNIFER DONSKY AND JULIE BERGER
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WITH
JILL LEPORE
An historian whose “discipline is worthy of a first-class detective” (New York Review of Books), Jill Lepore is the author of the National Book Award finalist Book of Ages, the story of Benjamin Franklin’s beloved but often-overlooked sister, Jane; New York Burning, winner of the Anisfield-Wolf Award and a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize; and The Secret History of Wonder Woman, the revealing feminist origin story of one of the most popular superheroes of all time. Her new book—These Truths: A History of the United States—is an ambitious biography of America as told through the intersection of politics, technology, journalism, and sketches of greater- and lesser-known leaders, mischief-makers, and visionaries. OTS WHAT ROLE HAVE LIBRARIES PLAYED IN YOUR OTS YOUR WRITING EXPLORES AND REVEALS “ABSENCES LIFE? WHAT ROLE DO YOU THINK THEY PLAY IN OUR AND ASYMMETRIES”—OMISSIONS, OVEREMPHASIS, 21ST-CENTURY WORLD? UNDEREMPHASIS—IN WHAT WE’VE LONG ACCEPTED JL I’m writing from a library right now! My office this year is deep AS “OFFICIAL” HISTORY. WHAT’S A KEY ABSENCE OR inside the stacks of Harvard’s Widener Library and I find it hard ASYMMETRY ADDRESSED IN THESE TRUTHS? ever to leave the library. When I was a kid, I could walk from my JL I’ve been fascinated for a long time by the gap between house to our town library, a little Carnegie building called the academic research in American history and American history in the Beaman Memorial Library. It had a kids’ section in the basement. I popular imagination. A lot of historians have been fascinated—and once got so obsessed with the weirdness of the “children’s room” troubled—by this gap, for a long time, of course. But I got especially that I went on a research bender on a story for The New Yorker— interested in it when the Tea Party movement emerged, early in “The Lion and the Mouse“—about the creation of children’s rooms 2009, when I happened to be teaching a course on the American and the astonishing story of how the first children’s librarian tried Revolution. I’d teach my students in the afternoon and go home to suppress E. B. White’s 1945 book, Stuart Little. I guess, don’t get and watch Tea Party rallies on television, and then I started me started on libraries; I’ll never stop. going to those rallies, and talking to people. There’s a lot to draw inspiration from, about events of the 18th century. But there’s a OTS THESE TRUTHS IS SUBTITLED A HISTORY OF lot of horror and misery in that century, too—the atrocity of slavery, THE UNITED STATES. WHAT LONG-TERM, PERVADING the grief of mothers losing most of their children in infancy, the CHARACTERISTICS OF OUR SOCIETY ARE FRONT AND brutality of conquest, all of which have been richly investigated by CENTER IN AMERICAN CULTURE AND POLITICS TODAY? scholars, but that just don’t make it into the popular imagination. I ARE NEW CURRENTS—OR “TRUTHS”—EMERGING? tried to get at some of that in a book I wrote a few years ago, Book JL The book is pretty squarely a political and intellectual history. of Ages, about the life of Benjamin Franklin’s sister, Jane. His life It’s a history of the ideas, political practices, and democratic was rags to riches, hers was rags to rags. That asymmetry—the institutions of the United States. The truths it concerns itself with absence of lives like hers from any popular understanding of the are “these truths” of the Declaration of Independence: political American Revolution—struck me as important to address, and try equality, natural rights, and the sovereignty of the people. The first to remedy. These Truths is an attempt to do that for the whole run part of the book looks at the origins of these ideas, and the rest of of American history. it asks, does American history prove them, or belie them? Does it deliver on them, or does it betray them? OTS TO YOU, THE FREE LIBRARY OF PHILADELPHIA IS ALSO THE FREE LIBRARY OF_. WHY? OTS THE STUDY OF HISTORY AND OTHER AREAS OF THE JL The world. Every library is a door that opens not inward but HUMANITIES HAS BEEN DEEMPHASIZED IN K–12 AND outward, from you, to the world, present, and past. HIGHER EDUCATION. WHAT IMPACT HAS THIS HAD ON AMERICAN LIFE? WHAT IS THE GREATEST LESSON TO BE LEARNED FROM THE STUDY OF HISTORY? TO LISTEN TO A FREE, DOWNLOADABLE JL In the book’s introduction, I quote from James Baldwin. “Know PODCAST FEATURING JILL LEPORE, VISIT whence you came.” No one has ever said it better. You have to FREELIBRARY.ORG/AUTHOREVENTS. know whence you came.
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