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LEARNER STORY
Megan Jones
- ROLE
- Virtual Library Assistant
- LIBRARY
- Conwy Cultural Centre / Wales, UK UK →
- COURSE
- Creating Powerful Displays Virtual Library Assistant
You can learn to tell a story with the stories we hold upon our shelves.
Megan completed two Opening the Book courses - Merchandising Library Shelves and Creating Powerful Displays - while her library was closed. She tackled the work in both with wonderful energy and creativity, using the ideas on each as starting points to develop her own thinking and plan new directions for how she'll work with readers and books in her library.
From the team's experience supporting Megan on these courses, she's a joy to work with and a wonderful asset to her readers and colleagues. She is both eloquent and original in how she interprets themes and creates displays, and her creativity is rooted in a sheer joy in working with readers and books - passionate about helping readers discover something new, with practical ways of achieving it.
01 Bringing display thinking online
In her other role as Virtual Library Assistant, Megan also has responsibility for promoting books online. She's converted ideas and themes designed for in-library displays into content that tempts her online newsletter readers to discover a great read - taking the same display logic and using it as the basis for digital promotion.
02 Surprising readers with the full range
Megan has an acute understanding of the appeal of books and reading, and of how important it is to exploit the full range of the library collection to surprise and delight different groups of readers. Rather than leaning on the books a library is already expected to have, she works the breadth of what's on the shelves - which is where the surprise comes from.
03 The adventure of the reader, first
More than anything, Megan sees the central importance of the library's role in her reading community. Her own framing is that borrowers wish to be challenged and immersed in new literature and new reading ventures - and that libraries can sometimes get pre-occupied with showing they have the latest big title, when those moments are necessarily fleeting. The real experience for readers is new and exciting displays running all year round.
Our borrowers wish to be challenged and immersed in new literature and new reading ventures. I think often we (as libraries) can be pre-occupied with showing that we have the new biggest title in, but ideally those moments are only fleeting and the real experience is new and exciting displays all year round. Put the adventure of the reader first - that is often first and foremost why our borrowers return time and time again. I would proffer this as the answer to all library assistants' age-old worry of 'I don't know what to display' - if your idea is strong and tangible for your readers, then it will work and there will be books that fit perfectly. You can learn to tell a story with the stories we hold upon our shelves!
