When Dudley, Sandwell, Walsall and Wolverhampton discovered they were missing out on a golden opportunity that would attract families and young children into their libraries, they decided to join forces through the Black Country Libraries partnership and develop a set of standards that would ensure families and children received the same welcome and support no matter which authority’s libraries they used.
Although still in its infancy, the resulting Family Friendly Standards are being viewed with great excitement as the only robust ‘tick-box’ style measuring toolkit in the country for assessing staff training and evaluating libraries on the way they look after the needs of families, babies, children and young people.
Research had shown that parents were worried that they’d be in trouble if their children were noisy or damaged the books. Plus, many families were oblivious to the range of exciting facilities and support on offer because of a lack of good marketing material.
Aware that libraries could play an important part in providing parental support to help with their children’s achievements and educational development, Library Heads from the four authorities organised a brain storm with Library Managers to look at ways of improving the welcome families received in libraries and for staff to understand the crucial role they play in encouraging and discouraging families in using the service.
“What the Partnership desperately needed was a consistent approach for all the libraries across the four Black Country authorities,” explained Marion Cockin, Assistant City Librarian, Children and Families at Wolverhampton.
What transpired was the Family Friendly Libraries Standards toolkit – a unique ‘tick-box’ style grid listing specific requirements that each library should strive to meet. Marketing material was also used to promote this.
Among the ‘promises’ outlined in the Family Friendly Library Standards are improved access, family-friendly changing and toilet facilities and baby feeding areas, and special play areas.
Specific activities included an annual book crawl, structured family sessions to help parent/guardians and children read more, plus book and rhyme sharing events.
Since the toolkit was launched in 2006, more than 200 front-line library staff have attended family friendly training sessions and the standards are now a core part of their job description.
Marion said: “Staff training was considered a crucial part of the Family Friendly Library Standards. First impressions are important and we also needed frontline staff’s input into the standards as a ‘reality check’.”
According to mum-of-three, Sara Paterson, the changes made by the Family Friendly Library Standards have been “brilliant”.
“The library is very important to me,” said Sara. “You can never spend too long in a library as a family. These new facilities make it a lot easier to enjoy the library as a family.”
Added Marion: “What the Partnership has managed to achieve is a marketing tool with specific promises that can be assessed every three years to make sure we are responding to families and other library user’s needs in a friendly manner.
“We hope that other West Midland Authorities will adopt the standards going forward.”
For more detailed information on Black Country libraries please visit the case study section on the MLA research website.