A third impression was the lack of fitness of some library workers for their posts. This is particularly unfortunate when it occurs in a children's room. Unless the person in charge possess the requisite qualifications, better far close the room. The fault lies perhaps with the colleges offering library courses. It may well be that the training in these should be more specialized than it is. Take the case of a student intending to pursue a given line of work—say children's departments. Something definite should be offered her, something corresponding in worth to the graduate courses in practice and observation offered students of education in departments of education at universities. This is a practical suggestion; it only requires on the part of colleges and libraries similar agreements to those already existing between universities and schools. A second phase of this question is that of libraries whose employees are not drawn from library schools or colleges, but who reach the several posts by a system of promotion based on efficiency and faithful service. Is there any reason why employees of such a system, specializing in children's work should not serve an apprenticeship in the children's department at central and be required to return to it again and again for further instruction? As far as I know the heads of these children's departments have no duties of this kind. But would not the value of a library corps be increased tenfold if they had? They seize eagerly the opportunity to go out and instruct the teacher, to go out and instruct the parent. They have classes for the schools in the use of the library. But they neglect utterly the training of the library employee who is to serve as assistant first, as chief later, in the children's room at branch or station. Yet the knowledge acquired by only one day of observation under skillful guidance in the children's department at central would prove invaluable to these women. Broaden the training given employees, and centralize experimentation.
I found no TRUE affiliation with the schools. There was none in North Carolina; there is none here. In countless ways the library and the school are overlapping. Why there should not be a clearer vision as to what is library work and what is school work is incomprehensible to an outsider.
I grew to have a horror of children's rooms—as distinct from children's departments. Intellectually, physically, morally, I believe them harmful. Neither can I see their necessity.
As regards classification of books, I received the impression that the broad division into "adult" and "juvenile" is too dogmatic, too arbitrary. Whatever other forms or divisions are necessary, this particular one should be abolished. It lowers the intellectual standing of the library with the community.
The splendid character of library work in tenement districts stood out strongly. It is vigorous, alive, with an ever-broadening opportunity.
More vivid, however, than any other impression, stronger still, was that of the time and thought and care bestowed on the Child. Everywhere, in city, town and suburban library, the effort to reach the Child is apparent. Special attendants are in readiness to meet him the instant he comes into reading room and station after school hours. Thoughtful women are assigned to overlook and guide his reference work. Entertainment is offered him in the form of blocks to play with, scrap-books to look at, story hours to attend. Books specially selected with regard to his supposedly individual needs are placed on the shelves. Picture bulletins are made for his use in the schools. Where he is not segregated he is allowed to monopolize tables and chairs. I find no corresponding effort made to reach the adult, to reach the young mechanic, to draw to the library the parent. I at times wonder whether librarians and custodians are even aware that exaggerated leaning toward one phase of library work must throw out of the true the work as a whole.
Nothing has astonished me more than this new development in library practice—the placing of the child in importance before the adult. The old belief that the library is primarily for adults and only incidentally for children still holds good at the central buildings of large city public library systems. In these we find the children's department only one of many departments—the child always subordinate, the adult dominant—the result of a well balanced, admirable whole, each unit in its proper place, all forces pulling together. I fail to see why the same relative balance should not be maintained throughout the entire system, from branch to station, not always in kind and measure, but approximately.
A second thought to which I cannot adjust myself—is that of the parent as a factor in school and library work. The parent believes in the public school, and he pays heavily in taxes for the education of his children by means of it. The parent believes in the establishment of public libraries and he pays heavily in taxes for their equipment. Both sums raised are sufficiently generous to enable school and library to furnish trained, capable, efficient teachers and librarians. Such being the case does not the parent show intelligence in turning over to the public care the direction of his children's education and reading? Is he not justified in so doing? Why then should he be held ignorant or selfish? Eliminate the parent as a factor in library practice. Give the children quality in books. Strike off 50 per cent., if you only will, of the titles to be found on the shelves of children's rooms. Substitute "adult" books, and you will not need to appeal to the parent to guide the child's choice.
That there is similarity of practice in library work, in North Carolina and here, you can hardly deny. Point by point, in so far as the work relates to the child, the problems are mutual. Their solution lies in the getting together of school and library authorities, and the setting aside of the modern thought that library work is primarily educative and primarily for the child. Let the schools educate the children; and, if you can, let the adult once more dominate in library practice. You will then have a well-balanced whole, free from over-emphasis on the child's side.