I know I haven’t updated in awhile, but I am posting bearing major news. As some of you may know, I’ve moved to a very remote community, north of 60. I’m working part time for their local youth center as well as volunteering full time in a public school. On my third day at the school, I was put in charge of a major project to completely overhaul the school library. I have to assess their entire collection, discard the outdated materials (I’m anticipating anywhere from 85%-95% of the collection will need to be thrown away or donated), order new acquisitions, implement a new, digitized cataloguing system and hopefully, if there is time, plan a literacy program.

It seems rather unbelievable, but the school is very understaffed and the library has been basically unused for 6 years. There is no librarian, so I am the most skilled in library and information systems there even though I haven’t graduated with an MIS yet. Everything is behind a decade. I’ll also be helping a few teachers learn how to use Dreamweaver and to do basic css coding. Currently, I am trying to convince them that making a site with frames is not the best idea. Remember frames? And card catalogues? Sometimes living in this town is like being in a time warp. Today, stopping by the corner store, I wanted to buy a can of chickpeas until I realized that while I knew the brand, I didn’t recognize its packaging design which had a serious 1990s vibe to it…

But I digress. I’m very excited right now because I have an insane amount of work to do. If there’s anything that motivates me, it’s planning a major project, identifying its core values/goals, breaking it down into tasks, setting deadlines, making budgets, delegating responsibilities and getting people to work. In my experience, the more organized you are when you lead, the more you do what you say you’ll do when you say you’ll do it, the more likely people will do what you ask. I feel lucky because the principal has been very supportive. In addition, the local head librarian at the public library has already been very generous with her time in advising me.

The students here desperately need to have a school library, not just to do research and study, but they need a reliable resource to gain literacy skills, academic skills, language skills (both Gwichin and Inuvialuit are “endangered”), life management skills (there are a lot of serious social problems up here) etc. And it’s sad, but some of them need access to a safe and stable environment so they can just stay away from home. (There is the youth center, but some students say that “it’s where the bad kids go” so they don’t use it. I don’t know about “bad”, but it cannot be denied that there is a very high prevelance rate here for kids with special needs or those from challenging backgrounds etc.)

Right now, I’ve just started and am feeling inspired so I hope I don’t start to burn out under the workload. The thing is, it’s difficult not to feel motivated and passionate about work here when you see how acute the need is. It’s sort of sad when the students ask me why I would work for the school when I’m not getting paid. They can’t seem to accept the idea that someone would want to help them without financial compensation, can’t seem to understand that some people really care about them and their welfare. Down south, youth can have such a strong, if not disproportionate sense of entitlement; here, it’s the opposite and the youth don’t seem to think they deserve much.

The TPL is having an online public survey to help them redesign their website. (via BlogTO)