Here's an example of a small rural South Carolina public library getting national recognition for winning a photo contest because I decided to do something just because it's cool.
A couple of weeks prior to National Library Week, I thought it might be "cool" for the SC State Library to sponsor a NLW Day in the life of SC Libraries photo contest to promote all the great things about libraries.
I created a Flickr group with photo contest rules (http://www.flickr.com/groups/nlwdayinsc/), sent out some emails, blogged about it, and we got some amazing submissions. There were 50 images submitted and the group had 38 members. A small group of SC State Library staff judged the images and the announcement was made.
This was one of the winners that Library Journal picked up. Also, their local chamber of commerce recognized the library on their marquee! What great free PR!
Simply because I did something I thought would be "cool" resulted in a small rural public library (Lee County, Bishopville SC) getting local, state, and national recognition. The byproduct being promoting reading, libraries, and also, with this image, making light of the past stereotype of libraries and librarians to in a sense say that libraries have changed to meet the changing needs of patrons.
Library 2.0 has brought our profession a long way!
Do something just because it's cool!
No comments:
Post a Comment