It’s been so energizing to watch the transformation sweeping through the campus and watching changes that perhaps it was hard for us to really envision until we saw it happening.

Suddenly, we can be almost paperless, the internet is everywhere in the building, and students can have the tools they need for the jobs they are doing.   They can work, explore, play, share, and study in a new way, as can the teachers.

It’s improved the workflow for everyone, since email is always accessible wherever we are(not to mention Facetime and other apps).   It’s creating a much more paperless environment, even within days, as teachers post their handouts and students read them online instead of printing them out.   It’s creating an organizational system for students as they keep their schedules on them and notes to themselves.   It’s created endless ways for them to create and collaborate and share.

As a librarian, I’ve played fly on the wall, and watched like a sociologist how students are using them in an unstructured environment, and so far, have been really pleased with what I’ve seen.   I’ve watched in two days the students put their iPads to a million different uses, from using Latin dictionaries, to studying their physics lab, to making a list of homework, to playing collaborative Scrabble, to photographing each other’s faces and using apps to play, to reading and highlighting a book, to playing games.

But also as a librarian, I’m really fascinated with how this might transform our library and what it looks like and is.    This really challenges my notion of what library is–stares it smack in the face.

We’re planning to purchase Overdrive, which will give us a small ($2,000 worth) collection of e-books that students can check out with the iPad app.   But what if I could provide most of the library that way?

We have lots of computers in our library, both in labs, and in the main library–what if the uses they were meant for before aren’t needed anymore?   We designed our space to be future proofed and flexible 3 years ago, but did we not see far enough ahead?  (I had asked for some walls to be sliding glass, but didn’t get as many of those as I had hoped–for that very reason–so we could open spaces up in the future if needed.)

We withdrew a huge section of literary criticism last week to make way for our iPad help desk in the library that will be staffed by students and because the information can be found in our databases.   A teacher just brought back a mobile laptop lab which she’d had in her room because “she doesn’t need it anymore.”

But libraries, though we are about a place to locate stuff, are really about being the guides to the “stuff.”   Being the “help desk” of sorts for questions, information seeking, serious research, project creation, and ideas.   Being the reader’s advisory–there are many good websites for that, but I know they can’t size up the student like the one I saw yesterday and in one minute know that Red Pyramid is the right book, and then watch the student exclaim Rick Riordan is my favorite author.

What I know for sure is that my head is still spinning thinking about what will change, and how to grab this change by the horns and create what our evolving library will be in the future.

So as I create iPad app recommendations and form app sharing groups, and still check out physical books, and navigate the 200 students who use our library every day at lunch, and help students navigate the information they need for papers and projects, this is what I will be thinking about.

But…what a difference one day has made.  And I know, as librarians, we all need to be thinking about this, because your library CAN change in just one day.

“Our research suggests that they expect to choose where and when they work; they use technology to escape traditional office space and hours; and they integrate their home and social lives with work life.  More than half of the Net Geners we surveyed online in North America say they want to be able to work in places other than an office. . . .They prefer flexible hours and compensation that is based on their performance and market value–not based on face time in the office.”   Don Tapscott, Grown up Digital

I’ve been thinking a lot about Tapscott’s comments about this particular expectation of Net Gen workers, because I believe that not only are we seeing Net Gen students in our classrooms and libraries, we are seeing Net Gen employees in our new(and sometimes in our experienced) staff as well.

After a fascinating coffee discussion with a colleague(both of us older than a Net Gener but sharing the characteristics of one) about our struggle with the transition from summer to “work”/school time,  I realized that as I spend more time online working with colleagues and as I have more experience, I am both more interested in how work can be “play” and also in the flexibility issue.

I wonder if we are losing the “creative set” of teachers from the classroom, as young Net Geners, (or older ones of us) who thrive on this sort of play, creativity, flexibility–but are still intensely committed employees–seek other opportunities.

And it’s a sad thought to me, thinking of the energies and talents that slip  away from education because the system isn’t all that flexible or playful.

I wonder if within existing schools what can be done about that.  Can libraries play a role in providing a time/space for ‘playfulness?”  What we can do would only be a drop in the bucket, possibly, but at least it is a start.  Yet in most schools, teachers don’t necessarily feel like they have that “Google-time”–that creative time to play and innovate–in fact, if “forced to play” teachers somewhat resent not having that time to use in their classroom or grading papers.  So what do you do if you want to foster some of that inventiveness and creativity yet have it be a meaningful part of the workplace?

Wouldn’t it be fabulous to have a job as a “creativity consultant” where your role was to bring in those creative energies and opportunities into a district?   Or the “innovation agent?”

It’s something we should be thinking about–because not only are we teaching Net Gen students, who crave this kind of flexible, playful, time shifting environment in our schools/classrooms, but we are employing Net Geners who crave these same things.  And don’t we want them to stay?

How are we really supporting their true needs?  Because I think Net Geners bring a whole range of skill sets that we need to work with “Net Gen” students.

Are we creating flexible work times?  Are we allowing some work to be done online?  Are we time shifting the idea of traditional classroom schedules?  Are we holding meetings online sometimes?  Are we building in some opportunity for creative growth or play?  And what does “play” for a teacher even look like and is this even possible with job demands/time pressures?  Are we creating open internet policies (like access to sites?–Tapscott posits that ten minutes knocking around on Facebook is like the old “coffee breaks” or “smoke breaks” of yore–time for relaxing/recharging).  Are we creating playful/flexible environments for students and staff alike?  (because some day soon, our entire staff and student body will be “Net Gen”.

Maybe we can only change the little circle of our own world at first(our classroom, our library, our department meetings, our workshops, our own workday schedule)–but maybe we should start somewhere?

When we fail to utilize what we know about our own employees and our own students, the divide between what is, and what the customer wants grows.   How can we utilize what we know, think outside the proverbial “box” and reinvigorate the concept of school in a Net Gen future?

Demise of library services as we know them? Will people still want to go to a place if they can get the item via their mailbox? (of course, it’s not free, you have a monthly fee, so the library is still a better deal !)

Similarly, I read in the NYTimes several articles relating to the demise of newspapers and/or magazines, including a touching one about the importance Bostonians have placed on their beloved and threatened Boston Globe, one about magazines raising their prices, and one about “hyperlocal” websites that bring aggregated local news to you customized for your location, and lastly a very telling one about newspapers and the AP attempting to control online content. Wes Fryer has been writing about this as well.

An armload of signs that are all pointing in the same direction–major change is on the horizon, driven by the economy as the tipping point. What will be telling is what communities fight to save–like the Boston Globe, and what things we let go. It will say something about us as a culture.

But more pertinent to this post is what is all of this going to mean for libraries? We are really at a tipping point? How much print content do we embrace and how much digital? When are our customers ready for what? What should we be willing to pay for if our students/staff mainly use “Google”? What will all this move to digital look like from a profit standpoint from publishers and providers that have excellent content?

So, renting books online….should we be mailing books to our students instead of them coming to us? sending them digital books via email? Only subscribing to magazines and newspapers online and not buying print ones? buying Kindles?

Yet students flock to our doors, check out more books than before, and use digital and books interchangeably. There is some need for a “campfire” to circle around for students. A place to be, to interact with books and knowledge and information….and to talk and hang out and do homework and get help when they need it.

On the other hand, I’ve found the teachers are somewhat more sequestered in their rooms with their own computers, so how do we reach them as well?

This is a mixed-up post which reflects the confusion over what direction to take.  It should be an interesting next few years.

I’d be really interested in views from my online learning community about these questions! What do you think?  Which way DO we go?

This led me to ask all sorts of questions of myself about what I want in an educational community, what fulfills me (and perhaps fulfills some students?) and which is perhaps another post.  But echoing in my thoughts after Educon were questions Will Richardson asked in his presentation yesterday and ones that were brought up by Andy Carvin and the panel this morning.

Questions like “What should we leave behind” and “What should we keep” as we make changes,  and questions like “How scalable is change?”  In the chat room this morning while listening to the Educon panel, we had a lively debate about this.

Is it different when talking about an existing school versus a brand new school?  I wonder how one creates a new sense of community in an existing school?     How do you invite people into the vision and ward off skepticism and get buy-in and really build a community of common purpose.

I also wonder if you have a vision for a school district, how do you scale that–or if you have something that works at one school, how replicable is it across a district?

So much of education is in the art of it–which really depends on the skill and talent of individual educators, (who are unique individuals and not replaceable) and the skill of leaders in particular.  But the culture of a school, which is so critical to change–how can that be conveyed across a district or across multiple districts?  Is that excitement of an environment that works scalable?  Or is it just kismet, a happy “accident,” a magical blending of time and people and place?

Does the business world have something to help us in terms of these questions?  How does a business like Apple or Toyota or Google sustain their corporate culture throughout their business?   What strategies do they use?    And how do you reach beyond a core group of teachers to create this new climate when perhaps people like the status quo?–status quo being something that seems pretty entrenched in education sometimes.

I left Educon this year(having only participated online in a few sessions) just as engaged and awed by the interactivity and excitement going on in the school for those kids as I did a year ago.   And also  awed by the enthusiasm, vision, and dedication of educators from all over the country(and world) who attended, either in person or remotely.   How do we spread/share this sort of enthusiasm, innovation, and energy with others–the kind of energy that brought the Flat Classroom Project to life?  If only we could harness that energy it could light up so many of our schools, and shine light for so many of our students.

(hint: Maybe Chris Lehmann should start a “leadership” academy at SLA to train/encourage/mentor future leaders?)

Okay, I’ve asked lots of questions, as is my habit in a post….but I really would love to hear your thoughts, musings, writings, and readings that you want to share.

Ironically, the quote on the sidebar of my blog today is:  “After all is said and done, more is said than done.  Aesop”     So, how do we harness all of this and bring it into some sustainable form?