Guidelines For Using Volunteers In Libraries

The use of volunteers in public services is traditional. Social services health, and welfare activities are well known for their extensive utilization of voluntary manpower. Volunteer programs in libraries are less well developed, and have been somewhat limited in size and scope.

Volunteer workers are unpaid staff, they give of their time and energy to assist an organization or institution to conduct certain kinds of programs or specific services. Volunteers are generally part-time workers, giving time over periods of short or long duration. Volunteers often bring to an activity and an organization a new outlook, a different perspective, added talents, a fresh approach, and a stimulating concept. They also bring a different motivation.

In considering the direct services gained by an institution from its volunteers, a library also needs to give cognizance to two other benefits often derived from volunteer assistance. First, community support, community utilization, and public relations are immeasurably enhanced by the direct and personal involvement of large numbers of persons in the activity. Volunteer workers are personally involved; they are a community liaison par excellence. Second, work experience is a major source of potential recruitment into occupations and professions. Many persons who do begin work on volunteer projects continue their education and training for careers in the same kind of work.

The use of volunteers in many types of services and programs may expand in the foreseeable future. The trend toward earlier retirement by professional and skilled workers, the increased need for wider public services, the earlier maturity of young people, the time and labor saving devices which bring more leisure, and the limited financial support of many agencies or institutions, all suggest an increased use of volunteers.

Principles for Success
The following principles should be borne in mind by libraries in using volunteers:

• Basic to the success of a volunteer program are prior planning and approval on the part of the staff and the governing body of the library.
• All the principles and good practices that relate to sound manpower administration, such as planning, training, evaluation, and development, must be applied to volunteer workers. 3. Planning for the use of library volunteers must include clarification of their status regarding such items as compensation for work-related injuries, insurance coverage when operating a library vehicle, and related benefits.
• Library volunteers may have work-related expenses which are to be paid for or reimbursed by the library. The library's policies and procedures regarding such expenses should be established and made known to volunteer before he begins library service.
• If it is essential that a minimum or basic library program be initiated or developed by volunteers, this use of voluntary persons should be considered as a temporary measure pending the employment of staff.
• Volunteers should not supplant or displace established staff position spaces.
• Recognition and appreciation of all voluntary assistance is imperative. As volunteers receive no salary, other forms of appreciation and recognition are essential.
• Volunteers should be assigned to meaningful work which makes use of their own talents, experience, training and interests.
• Volunteers should be assigned to those jobs which they feel competent to do and for which they have been trained and given orientation.
• Volunteer assignments should generally be for specific time periods to enable the library and the volunteer to review, evaluate, and reassign duties.
• There should be a staff coordinator of volunteers.
• Continued orientation and training is essential for volunteers to keep them informed of procedures, policies, etc., just as is the continued training of regular staff members.
• The staff should have training on the use of volunteers and should share responsibility for the success of the volunteer program.
• Written, detailed job descriptions for volunteers are necessary.
• Realistic scheduling of volunteers is essential; this may mean some overlapping or duplication of personnel schedule, to cover emergencies and absences.
• Programs and services must be planned bearing in mind the possible termination or unavailability of volunteer help.
• Friends of Libraries, parent-teacher associations, and other groups occasionally provide volunteer services and programs. Some kinds of volunteer assistance may best be provided through such organizations.

Types of Work
These are some kinds of work which have been done by library volunteers: sharing of books with children in Head Start and day care groups; preparation of picture files; presenting film programs; making of Braille, talking books, and tapes; making deliveries to home-bound borrowers; storytelling to children in libraries and other locations; teaching in literacy classes; conducting discussion groups inside and outside the library; mending library materials; shelving returned materials; making publicity materials for the library; planning exhibits in the library; preparation of oral history collection; collection of historical and archival materials; preparation of a clipping and vertical file; inspecting and repairing audiovisual materials; manning a circulation desk; manning a book cart in a hospital or home for the aged; and working with outreach programs.

Adopted 1/71, Board of Directors,
Library Administration Division ALA.

Prepared by the Division of Library Development, Connecticut State Library, 9-97.

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