Five Year Horizon for Our Library Learning Commons

 Reading through the NMC Horizon Report for Libraries, it was good to see the approach they took to some of the challenges facing libraries.  Geared to a wider audience, they tackled a variety of challenges facing libraries, and many of them were applicable to our smaller library.

I've used their format to identify some of the challenges facing our LLC at a secondary school:

	1 Year
Solvable - Those that we understand and know how to solve	Information Literacy: Continued integration of Research/Citation practices in all curricular areas.   Creating aware, informed, and empowered students who navigate information well.  The Horizon report cited 'mindful media consumption' as way to combat the prevalence and prominence of 'fake news'.  Increased use for online subscription services.
Difficult - Those that we understand but for which solutions are elusive	Staffing in the library remaining at 1.0 TL Secured funding for subscription services
Wicked - Those that are complex to even define, much less address	Achieving consensus on cell phone use in class.  While this may seem like a classroom issue, at its heart, it is about the ways that students access information (or distract themselves from it.)

 

	2-3 Years
Solvable	Effective curation of teacher resources. Project redesigns and collaboration that deliver curriculum in engaging ways. Increased awareness of copyright law for students and teachers
Difficult	Adherence to copyright law for teachers More services online
Wicked	Changing contract language to increase TL time in our library. Equitable access to technology for all students

 

	5 Years
Solvable	Weeding out old/decrepit/unnecessary resources
Difficult
Wicked	Physical space redesign to remove unnecessary bookshelves to create more makerspaces.

Works Cited:

Adams Becker, S., Cummins, M., Davis, A., Freeman, A., Giesinger

Hall, C., Ananthanarayanan, V., Langley, K., and Wolfson, N.

(2017). NMC Horizon Report: 2017 Library Edition. Austin, Texas:

The New Media Consortium.