[Michlib-l] Volunteers in the Library, Compilation

[Sharon Crotser-Toy]

Thanks, everyone, for responding to my information request regarding how
you are using volunteers in your library.

Someone has asked that I post the compilation, so here goes! I didn't
include attachments because I have a vague recollection of there being
privacy issues associated with compilations..? If you're interested, I'll
be happy to contact the sender.

-Sharon Crotser-Toy
Assistant Director
Allegan District Library
Allegan, MI 49010
269-673-4625
..................................................................................

We use court ordered and other volunteers to empty the drop boxes and to
feed materials into our automated book return.  They also pull MeL requests
from our collection, weed our gardens, tend all the plants in the building,
help put craft and story time materials together, book sales, staff the
gift shop, paint, etc.
We have every volunteer fill out our application (attached) which gives us
sufficient information to determine whether we can match this person to a
task or not.  We do ask for birthdate which while not legal on an
application for employment was okayed by attorney for this purpose.  You
might want to check with your own attorney for his/her interpretation of
the questions on this form or any similar one you choose to use.

Our volunteers (we have about 40 Friends, various Community Service, and
only one MiWorks person right now) do all of our shelving taking materials
from the sorting shelves out to the library shelving by the cart load.  A
long term volunteer supervises this work and teaches new volunteers how to
shelve.  Our Circ Supervisor is ultimately in charge of this task.
Volunteers do flatbed scanning of historical materials for us, document
copying, sorting of books for the Friends book sale, prep for crafts, read
to Young Fives through a program in the schools coordinated by the library,
and yes they do dust and clean fingerprints off windows.  We also have
summer only volunteers who weed and care for our outdoor spaces.  Very
dedicated volunteers run a D&D program one Saturday per month and a LEGO
program is restarting this fall.  Volunteers do much of the processing of
our books putting on covers, setting RFID tags and general quality control
before the books go on shelves.  Our Processing Supervisor does the
cataloging and is responsible for the work of this set of volunteers.  One
volunteer checks shelved for lost, missing, and claims returned books using
our monthly lists.

In general we avoid tasks involving the linking of patron name to materials
so volunteers do not checkout or checkin or work with holds.  They do the
pick list for ILL for us as that has only book names on it.

Clearly we would be in trouble if our volunteers deserted us

Like you, our most frequent "volunteer" job is cleaning, be it indoors or
out (our library has almost an entire block of public grounds including
several flower beds). We also use them for prepping craft materials for
programming (we don't purchase many kits, so there's always something
needing copied, traced, cut, etc.), inventory, and collection weeding
projects.

Our volunteer policy is attached. We do have other volunteer tasks listed
on the policy, but these occur less frequently than those I mentioned above.
Our volunteers help with these things...
Processing materials
Shelf reading
Watering plants in the building
Gardening outside
Book sales (in coordination with Friends of the Library)

We have a great group of high functioning adults with mental disabilities
who volunteer through the local mental health agency. They generally take
care of the following.
Washing plastic magazine covers
Buffing and cleaning of CD / DVD discs

We generally don't have volunteers with court ordered community service.
At the Sterling Heights Public Library, our volunteers cut out our craft
items for programs, shelf read, pull books from a weeding report, organize
drawers of bookmarks, flannel boards, puppets, etc.  I don' t think we have
any written procedures,  I'll ask to make sure and forward them if we do.
It depends on their skill set and what they are doing the community service
for. If its dishonesty, I don’t want them volunteering for me. We had a
contractor that had a DUI that did a lot of painting and repairing this
spring. It was really nice.
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