Building Equity-Based Summers (BEBS) Podcast
In this monthly podcast we talk about topics that help library staff and communities build services that are equitable. Learn more about the project on our site: https://equitybasedsummers.org
Building Equity-Based Summers (BEBS) Podcast
Episode #11: How Summer Traditions Impact Equitable Summer Practices
In this bite-size episode we continue our conversation with Sara White, Youth Services Consultant at the Washington State Library, and focus on the summer service traditions library staff hold on to, the history of those traditions, and the importance of reimagining traditions in order to provide equitable summer services.
Resources mentioned in the podcast:
- A History of Youth Summer Reading Programs in Public Libraries
- Changing the Mindset of Pre-Service Librarians: Moving from Library Servants to Public Servants
- BEBS Podcast #8: Reimagining Libraries: Acting as a Public Servant to Foster Community Connection
Building Equity-Based Summers is funded in part through the Institute of Museum and Library Services..
Hi everybody, Welcome to the BEBS Building Equity-Based Summers podcast. I'm Linda Braun and I'm one of the people working on the Building Equity-Based Summers project. Of the people working on the Building Equity-Based Summers Project, both nationally through our IMLS funding, and in California, and I'm here with my colleague, Lakeisha Kimbrough. Lakeisha, introduce yourself.
Speaker 2:Hi everyone. I'm Lakeisha Kimbrough and I have the immense honor of working alongside Linda and other amazing folks supporting the BEPS work, and we are here today with one of our amazing state librarian folks from Washington Sarah. Sarah, who are you?
Speaker 3:Hello everybody. My name is Sarah White and I am the Youth Services Consultant at the Washington State Library.
Speaker 1:Sarah, we talked to you last month about lessons learned through BEBS and in that conversation we started talking about the traditions of summer reading and some of the history of summer reading, and I think one of the things we wanted to start with you with is like, what are you thinking about that? And I know there was a conversation you and I had as a part of another project and I'd be really curious for you to talk a little bit about that conversation and what it made you think about as we consider summer reading history and summer reading traditions.
Speaker 3:It was really cool to talk to someone who wasn't involved in BEBS, because the person we were talking to was talking about prizes and about how patrons are disappointed about prizes because they're comparing the prizes to another library. They were in and Linda and I were just like prizes to another library. They were in and Linda and I were just like why? Why does that matter? And then it turned into this really great conversation where this person, who is extremely smart and like, really thoughtful, was just like, oh, I had not considered it in this way Because, again, it's so built into our system that we do things in a way that we don't even question it.
Speaker 3:So just even being prompted to ask the question and given 10 minutes to think about it changed someone's feelings about something, or at least made them think about it. So we don't have to be doing these. Like it's awesome to be able to spend a lot of time with people doing really in-depth conversations and workshops, but, like, sometimes all you need is like 15 minutes and you talk to someone and you have a really interesting conversation that moves something forward.
Speaker 1:I love that conversation, sarah. One of the things that came up in that conversation, sarah, is an article paper that you found about the history of summer reading, which really framed a lot of what we talked about, and it was pretty awesome. We'll include that in the show notes for this podcast episode. And then the other thing I was just thinking about, sarah, when you were talking about that where did this idea of prizes come from?
Speaker 1:And I think something we've learned is like the history of summer Like where did all these ways that we do summer come from? And did anybody ever really think about equitable practices within that right? It's like we've got this whole identity around summer. Why? Why is that like that? And so I can't remember what our research found as we were in that conversation, but it's been since like the 1950s or something that people started offering prizes and then it just became this thing not necessarily the best thing, not necessarily right thing, but we just do what we've always done. And so part of the Bev's work is that's super interesting to me is how do we ask why we do these things and then how do we break tradition? Like we've learned that those two things are really challenging for people.
Speaker 3:And if we learn where the tradition came from, it suddenly becomes a lot less sacred. So that article that we're talking about, linda, which is someone's MLIS project, was to do research on the history of summer reading, and you can find this research paper that they did online and I actually. So we were trying to figure out which search terms to use to find information about prizes and incentives and I figured out what that better search term was, which is reward, this idea that like you're getting something in exchange for doing something. And when I looked up the word reward, I was finding stuff even earlier, like 1920s, where you're finding stuff about rewards. And it's really interesting, like it's amazing, how just taking the time to learn and read about something can so easily switch your worldview on something like originally the purpose of summer reading programs. From this, at least if this article is accurate, which you know, it was a researched article by an MLIS student.
Speaker 3:The goal was to help people read better books. Better books like not mass market, like mass produced trash it was like people thought they were being that children were reading trash and that librarians could guide them towards the not trash and that and also to help teach them how to take better care of books and not ruin them, like if you read this article, like the origins of summer are so far removed from what we care about in libraries today that it feels so much easier to throw it away when you know the origins, because you're like I don't care. We want children to trash our books. We want kids to read stuff that is silly and fun and not for intellectual enrichment, because it brings them joy and joy. If that's what early librarians and libraries cared about, maybe it's easier to let go of it.
Speaker 2:And easier to maybe ask ourselves and this goes, I think, along with something else that we talk about in BEBS that has been challenging. That's something we've really learned is humans we know this about humans in general is letting go of tradition or reimagining tradition, right, and so one of the things to be able to do that means really doing some learning and exploring about how this tradition came to be. How is it still serving us? Is it still serving us? Are there pieces we we need to or want to reimagine?
Speaker 2:And, sarah, as you were talking, I was thinking, okay, if we know these things, then we can ask ourselves does that still matter to us?
Speaker 2:Right, we can begin to ask the questions that maybe we didn't know, to ask that actually get us closer to what we're hoping for.
Speaker 2:But again, coming back to what you shared, when we know that history, when we can see kind of that through line, we can begin to ask things like oh, is that what really matters to us for summer reading now, which then can help us get closer to what our actual why is for that, which is something else we talk about. Um, it is really understanding our why. So I'm just grateful that you, that this has come back up in terms of understanding the history of how, how we got here or where it even started, so that we know what it's rooted in and then if maybe it needs to be transplanted, maybe it's outgrown its pot, maybe, and that's okay, and I think that's the other thing is it's okay because we get so connected to tradition, even when we don't understand the history of the tradition, and then there's some component of our identity, but that's who we are, and without the exploration of is that really who we are, or have we become? Maybe that was who we are and we've grown and that's okay, right? So what's that mean to think about those kinds of things?
Speaker 3:Some goodness, sarah, some goodness. Another interesting thing about this paper is it also talks about early critiques of summer reading programs and that people have always been questioning them, so it's not new to question them. In 1940, someone wrote an article about how the programs were only rewarding good readers and punishing slow reader, like all the stuff we're still talking about today. So like we are part of a long tradition of questioning and thinking, and that it I mean it. In some ways, it's frustrating because we're still talking about the same things that we were talking about almost 100 years ago as being problems with summer reading programs, but it's not like people have just always taken these things as at face value, as the way it should be.
Speaker 1:You know, you're also saying that, sarah. You're making me think that that is part of why people don't reflect, why they don't get to go out into the community, is because we've it's like it's the tradition. We've always done it this way and, even if people have been questioning it for almost 100 years, this is how we know how to do it. I don't know if I'm making sense, right, and so it's, we're just going to keep doing it.
Speaker 1:And it also makes me think how unequitable summer services have always been. Right, because you're talking about reading trash and they're talking about what all those other things are. It's like that's not what you should be concerned about. You should be concerned about the community and the youth, and right, not just it's the library servant mindset, it's about like, what do I think young people should be reading? And so that's what our summer program is going to be about, as opposed to what's going on in the community. And so it's clear to me that this is always I mean, I knew this, but thinking about it this way it's always been inequitable. We've never really worked with the communities who we need to be working with.
Speaker 3:Talking about this paper, but one more tidbit from this paper that I found fascinating is that early summer reading programs were specifically designed for urban kids, because all of the rural kids were working on their farms and the urban kids needed something to do because they weren't literally working, and that's one of the reasons they started. And who's right? Who's being served by that from the beginning, right?
Speaker 3:like from the very beginning the kids who aren't getting access to this program are the kids who are literally keeping food on their family's table because of summer reading, summer programs, summer learning.
Speaker 1:Really want to thank you, Lakeisha and Sarah, for starting this conversation. I don't think this will be the last time we talk about it and maybe our next jumping off point will be specifically about audience, Since, Sarah, you were just talking about the youth who were literally putting food on the table not being served by summer services. So thank you all. Thank you, Linda. Thank you.
Speaker 2:Sarah.
