Environment
80% of parents in rural communities want their children to study here instead of in another public location.
What is the library?
Four out of five respondents agree it is the only place in their rural community that offers free printing, wifi, and technology support in one space.
What is the library?
Despite multiple library workers suggesting to visit this in order to get more information about library operating hours and technology offerings, both librarians and patrons agree that this “place” is not effectively utilized.
What are "public library websites"?
The majority of library worker respondents stated that their rural library had equal or less than this number of employees, which validates similar claims made in previous literature over the past 20 years.
What are fewer than five employees?
More than half of surveyed parents believe their K-12 child would rather do schoolwork here than at another public location in their rural community.
What is the public library?
The majority of library worker respondents believe their libraries adequately provide this particular service to their community.
What are technology services?
Over 50% of libraries interviewed have staff that are primarily working shorter hours, making them these types of employees.
What are part-time employees?
80% of parent respondents cited this technology resource -- either through personally-owned devices or library-lent devices -- as an essential technology offering, thus validating previous literature on the topic.
What is on-site internet access?
Some respondents cited familiarity or friendship with library staff as the reason for this; others noted the calm and quiet environment and availability of workspaces, as well as the ability for additional family members to safely explore the premises while school-aged children did schoolwork.
What are reasons families prefer the library for students to work on schoolwork?
100% of survey respondents and interviewees go to their local library at least this often in order to meet their family's technology needs for homework.
What is once a week?
One interview participant in our study wished her library had better options for this to include later evenings and Sundays, which was contrary to survey results on the same topic, where 75% of survey respondents were satisfied with this.
What are library operating hours?
DAILY DOUBLE: Surprisingly, this topic never came up in our preliminary research, but was revealed in our research to be a very important technology resource offered in libraries, nearly on par with internet access.
What are library-offered printing services?
One interview respondent suggested the lack of this meant she would not use free, library-provided wifi outside of library operating hours.
What is “a safe place for her family to sit outside the library”?
More than half of library workers surveyed believe meeting "this" is part of a rural library's responsibility.
What are the technology needs of a rural community?
Rural libraries may be unable to meet the technology needs of their community due to lack of this resource.
What is sufficient funding?
In previous research, community feedback was "overwhelmingly positive," and the sentiment was echoed by 80% of our respondents, who either “agreed” or “strongly agreed” with the statement: "My library adequately provides for my child's technology needs".
How do parents feel about library-provided technology used by their children?