It was a busy time in the library for the 1st six weeks of school. The numbers don't lie! We had over a thousand books circulated, which is great for our little high school. Plus we saw over 200 classes. We saw TCC classes, the sophomore English students, the junior English students, and the ELL class which inspired me to redo my signage in the library to include the 7 major languages spoken on our campus, but that is a topic for a future post.
At a previous High School Librarian meeting, Pam asked us to write and rehearse our "elevator speech." You know that speech you have set for an outsider when they ask the simple question, "How is it going in the library?" Instead of saying, "everything is fine," you have something more intelligent to say. My elevator speech usually highlights one or more of the six weeks usage statistics.
Like right now, this is my elevator speech . . .
"I am so glad you asked about our library. Did you know we saw 3,200 visitors during the last 6 weeks. Yes, that is more than our total number of students enrolled in our school. We just love that our students are repeat visitors. There is so much to see and do in our library. Come by anytime. I'd love to show you around."
My second elevator speech (in case I talk to the same people, or I just want some variety) is . . .
"I am so glad you asked about our library. Did you know that half of our student population checked out a book during the last 6 weeks. We circulated 1,031 books. It looks like Mysteries and Graphic Novels have been the most popular books to be checked out so far this year. I just love to see our students reading. Come by anytime. I'd love to show you around."
So if you haven't been convinced about keeping your library usage statistics, they really do come in handy for multiple reasons. The elevator speech is just one idea. I also like to blast our stats on social media and email them to our staff. It's important to get your story out there, and statistics is one what to do just that. Because if you don't tell your story, someone else will.
