Site of the Month: TeenLibrarian.com
Walter Minkel -- School Library Journal, 12/1/2002
Miranda Doyle (mdoyle@teenlibrarian.com), a young adult librarian at the Excelsior branch of the San Francisco Public Library, took a Web design class at City College of San Francisco. The result of her studies is a clean site for librarians who work with students ages 12 to 18.
Finding its feet: TeenLibrarian.com, which was launched in August, is still finding its feet. The site includes a home page in the form of a Web log, or blog, that features news of interest to teen librarians. There's also a message board called "At Issue," where site visitors can have their say on topics relating to teen librarianship. The first discussion topic was "What do you call yourself?" Most participants agreed that "teen" was a better term to describe their clientele than "young adult"—a term teens themselves don't use. "Young adult is a 'lesser' term," said one participant. "It implies a low category of adult." Others, who serve both children and teens, use the term "youth librarian."
Spreading the word: Doyle says the site has a public library emphasis now, but she invites middle- and high-school librarians to participate. In the future, she hopes to interview authors and experts on teen life. But for now, her goal is to spread the word about the site.
