Public post for Library Day in the Life Day 5
Should technically have been yesterday, but this was the best I could do. I’m a library assistant in a public library in the UK.
7am Got up and realised that having had a late night meant I had forgotten to defrost any bread for lunch and tea. Bad start.
8.30am Arrived at work. Told that a colleague had a dentist appointment so I would have to cover public computers until she returned. Turned on computers, put early arriving members of public on computers, read emails, started to work on updating the homework links pages of website which I had been working on last week, checking for broken links, suitable content etc. Dealt with customers needing assistance with computers. This morning it was general stuff like scanner assistance (I give them the instructions, they do not read the instructions, I go over and tell them exactly the same thing as the instructions because I wrote the instructions) and some email problems. One lady had found another person had left their email signed in, hadn’t realised and had sent emails from the other person’s account. A gentleman had reset his email password yesterday and now couldn’t remember it…or the answers to his security questions…and demanded I get someone else who "would know more about it". Customer service through gritted teeth is sometimes required.
Also an interesting moment when every PC in the building rebooted. Not the best unexpected happening…
11am Colleague arrived back from dentist! Hurrah! In the office to talk to Assistant Reference Librarian about the homework pages. Links were mostly accurate but the whole layout hadn’t been touched in some time so needed updating and the academic standard varied wildly. We had decided to aim at Key Stages 2 and 3 as being the most likely to need the resources so I’d added a lot of new links. It was nice to use my previous life for something other than children’s activities!
12noon Went to buy lunch. During lunch hour talked to librarian about Space Hop (Summer Reading Challenge) activity she had run yesterday. We’re doing the same activities tomorrow (last year we had about 70 children) so it was good to pick up a few tips on what worked well.
1pm Covering main lending area. Set up resources for rhyme time so that they would be ready for another colleague to run the session in the afternoon. Children’s library already full of children…
2.30pm Meeting with one of the teenage volunteers who will be helping at our Space Hop activities tomorrow. All volunteers are working towards an award and are meant to arrange to come to the library for a health and safety visit beforehand. Spent a while with her doing tour of library etc. After that, back on the counter for rest of afternoon. Very busy serving customers, a lot of Space Hop joining, giving out stickers, printing certificates etc. Often 3 or 4 staff on the counter at once to deal with the queues today. Enquiries included: Books for an adult numeracy course Level 2, books on teaching religious studies in primary school (twice in one day!), council tax payment, finding a school clothing grant form.
4.30pm Tea break featuring beans on (now defrosted) toast.
5pm Evening spent in teenage section. General number of teenagers playing some sort of card game who left after a while. Spent some time ringing borrowers to let them know reservations have arrived. Fielded advances of regular customer who likes to make ‘inappropriate’ remarks. Answered phone enquiries which were mostly renewals but also included setting up online services for a lady and talking her through how to renew books online. Finished off homework help updating (trying to think of a name for the period of history between Tudors and Victorians proved particularly tricky!).
8pm Caretaker is currently off sick and there were no senior staff on duty in our department tonight so I locked up everything internally (Victorian library building = lots of doors!) then helped colleagues lock up externally.
Tags: librarydayinthelife, public post, work
