Transitions in uncertainty: a message from the InsideOCULA Editor-in-chief
Rob Makinson introduces the new editorial team, shares some magazine updates, and reflects on volunteerism during a pandemic.
Working from home: Printing is essential!
Working from home has been a necessity during the pandemic and it can be expensive. Maybe public policy makers need to think more carefully about how essential services are defined in a public health crisis.
Library tech services are crucial to social well-being during a pandemic
Core tech services such as internet connectivity and access to computing devices are crucial to those people who do not have an alternate means of access in their local communities.
Not too fine a point: COVID-19 reveals the origins of public libraries as agents of social control
In Library Land, the pandemic has exposed inherent fragilities including discriminatory class and race based practices. In turn, these praxis reveal that public libraries have a history of being agents of social control and exclusion.
Care calls, PPE production and more: How Ontario public libraries have responded to COVID-19
To learn more about how public libraries were responding and adapting to physical buildings closures, OLA issued a survey in March 2020. Here are the summarized results of this survey.
Collecting and using data productively in a time of COVID-19
Data may not be coming up in library-related conversations very often at present, but perhaps it should because good data collection and use will help us by improve and showcase our services.
The COVID-19 effect on small rural libraries
COVID-19 has definitely created new access needs. Unfortunately, not everyone has a well-equipped home office that comes with internet access, which is where the public library can help.
“Can I take your order?”: Curbside library services in the age of COVID-19
Six months ago, drive-thru library circulation was a laughable idea. But now academic library services have been flipped on their heads and curbside pickup is very popular.
Six “big” K-12 library questions in a pandemic world
Recently, members of the Ontario School Library Association (OSLA) council had "big questions" when they chatted online about the pandemic and its impact on K-12 school library learning commons.
The new model public library
Someone will have to pay for all the government money being used to get us through the COVID-19 crisis. This will usher in a newer, longer and deeper era of austerity and a new understanding of what defines a “model public library.”
Dr. Paul’s pandemic ponderings: Closure is a step towards the future
The University of Sudbury library closed on March 24, 2020. Now past the three-month mark of the closure, the chief librarian thinks that the "new virtual" reality will help him be anywhere, anytime and thus step into the future.
To be perfect or not
Many of us are busy making instructional videos so that we can teach or provide needed services online. But how do we battle our need for the perfect performance? And many times do we re-record before we think we've got our final product?
Black Lives Matter: Does silence signal complacence in public libraries?
I have been waiting for a statement from my local library on the recent protests aimed at confronting systemic anti-black racism in our North American society and across the Western world. It has been weeks and I am still waiting.