FYI,

YALSA releases Teen Services Competencies for Library Staff

The Young Adult Library Services Association (YALSA), a division of the American Library Association, has released a new resource to help libraries better serve teens called Teen Services Competencies for Library Staff.

The Teen Services Competencies for Library Staff describe the knowledge, skills and dispositions all public and school library staff need to successfully serve the nation’s 42+ million teens. They were developed in alignment with YALSA’s report, The Future of Library Services for and With Teens: a Call to Action.

The Competencies were created to assist current library staff as well as to prepare pre-professionals with providing relevant, age-appropriate services, collections, and programs to better the lives of all teens in their community. Accompanying the Competencies is a glossary and a list of selected resources to provide library staff with a path to further exploration of topics mentioned in the document. 

Read and download the guidelines and supplementary materials here, as well as access a schedule of free webinars about putting the guidelines into action. 

To learn more about YALSA’s other national guidelines, as well as its other resources such as position papers, and benchmarks that aim to aid librarians, library workers and libraries in better understanding the components of an excellent teen services program, visit http://www.ala.org/yalsa/guidelines.

For more than 50 years, YALSA has worked to build the capacity of libraries and library staff to engage, serve and empower teens.  For more information about YALSA or to access national guidelines and other resources go to www.ala.org/yalsa, or contact the YALSA office by phone, 800-545-2433, ext. 4390; or e-mail: ...@ala.org">yal...@ala.org.

Best regards,

Sharon Rawlins, MLS

Youth Services Specialist for Lifelong Learning

NJ State Library

185 West State St.

P.O. Box 520

Trenton, NJ 08625-0520

...@njstatelib.org">sraw...@njstatelib.org

609-278-2640 ext. 116

609-278-2650 – fax

CSLP 2017-2018 Past President