Long before the phrase “fake news” came into vogue, libraries were fighting the good fight against misinformation, unreliable sources and the general confusion of the internet era.
Monday was the beginning of National Library Week, and as a part of the American Library Association’s event, the group published its annual State of America’s Libraries Report, noting trends that have developed across the country.
According to the report, librarians provide users with expertise and the training needed to evaluate the quality of information in all formats. The report shows the library community continues to share best practices to help fuel efforts to combat disinformation. With the massive increase in the amount of digital content, libraries are ramping up efforts to make sure children and teens are well-equipped to evaluate the sources, content and intended message of all types of media.
Locally, computer access and helping visitors learn how to navigate the internet to secure essential services remains an important and growing part of the library’s mission, even at a time when state funding for libraries continues to be cut.
“For us, it often starts at the basic level,” said Erin Busbea, director of the Columbus-Lowndes Public Library. “We offer computer classes and they start on the very, very simplest level — ‘This is how you hold the mouse,’ or ‘Here’s how you double-click.’ You might think it’s older people, but sadly, we have people in their 20s that don’t know even the basics about computers. Our staff is always going over and helping people, because a lot of them struggle and, for them, these are important things they are trying to do.”
In West Point, where Tanna Taylor serves as library director for the four-county Tombigbee Regional Library System, visitors to the library depend on computer access at the system’s 10 mostly rural facilities.
“I’ve heard people say, ‘Why do we even need libraries anymore when we have smartphones?”‘ Taylor said. “But the truth is, the library may be the only place they have access to the internet for a lot of people in the poor, rural communities we serve. Today, you can’t apply for a job at even a fast-food restaurant without going online. You can’t sign up for Social Security or health care.
“To give you an idea of how much things have changed, we used to order boxes and boxes of forms from the IRS, and people would stop by and pick up the forms they needed to do their taxes,” she added. “Now, the IRS doesn’t even want us to order those forms. They tell us to tell everybody to go online.”
In addition to those essential services, many use the library computers to continue their education.
“Every year we have to file a report on computer usage,” Busbea said. “For the last reporting period, we had more than 60,000 computer sessions on our computers. So there is really a high demand. We see a lot of people taking online classes and doing classwork. For a lot of these people, they simply couldn’t further their education if they didn’t have access to our computers.”
The 10 libraries in the Tombigbee Regional Library System are mostly located in small, rural communities of Clay, Monroe, Choctaw and Webster counties.
“A really high percentage may have a computer, but they don’t have internet at home,” Taylor said. “And they may live miles and miles from a city where they can get services. So for a lot of them, it’s not just a lack of internet access, it’s also a transportation issue. For them, our little libraries are extremely important. It’s the only access they may have.”
Slim Smith is a columnist and feature writer for The Dispatch. His email address is [email protected].
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