#20: Have visual alarms

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The next time you do a fire drill (and if you can’t remember the last time your library did one, you are due), check to make sure your alarms have working flashing lights so that Deaf as well as hearing people will be alerted to the emergency. If your alarms are auditory only, ask your facilities team to see if the library can replace them with ones with a visual component.

#18: Beginning readers come in all ages

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Imagine an adult patron who is in the process of learning to read and wants to practice with library materials. Do you have books that are appropriate for their reading level but also for their age? How hard are these books to find? If it’s not reasonable to pull them out into a separate section, can you create a list of suggested titles that staff can help patrons find and borrow? In addition, assess not just the discoverability and size of materials for new adult readers, but also their quality. Do they contain compelling facts or interesting information that will make someone feel rewarded for reading, or are they dated, simplified versions of ‘classic’ literature that are unlikely to resonate with a new reader?

#17: Learn from the best

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Do you have a coworker who is really good at working with a group of people you struggle to serve well? We probably all have that colleague who is amazing with gestures and who everyone calls on to help the Spanish-speaking patron when none of the Spanish-speaking staff is in, or the children’s librarian who can get kids on the autism spectrum to tell her what they need when the rest of us can’t even get them to look in our direction. Spend a while watching that person and see if you can figure out what they do well and copy it, or, even better, tell them that you’ve noticed that they are great at x and see if they can share any tips or techniques with you.

#14: Get a readable keyboard

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Do you have a large print keyboard, and/or one with a Braille overlay? If not, can you afford to purchase one, or at least to purchase stickers to put over the keys of an existing keyboard? Even stickers (or replacement keys) with regular-sized type can be helpful to improve a worn keyboard. This is especially true if you serve a lot of older patrons, who are more likely to be in the early stages of learning to use a keyboard and thus can’t infer that what looks like a “C” in the top row is actually a worn-away “O.”

#13: Take care with heritage displays

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If you’re an American library worker, you are probably at the beginning of heritage month season, and considering highlighting relevant items in your library’s collection. Be careful with this. If you are putting together a display for Asia Pacific Islander Heritage Month, Hispanic Heritage Month, Black History Month, or Native American History Month, take a few extra minutes to really think about the color scheme, decorations, and items from the collection that you are including. Showing off outdated, unattractive materials sends a message of “the library doesn’t actually care about serving the people in this group” and choosing things that reinforce stereotypes (even positive ones) can send a message of “the people who work here don’t understand this culture.” If you don’t have material for a good display on hand, it might be better to skip it this year than to put up something that sends the wrong message.

#11: Don't make you tell me again

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If a patron discloses a disability to you that affects how it’s best to work with them, consider asking if you can put a note about it in their patron record so that other staff know how to help without the person having to re-explain each time they deal with someone new. This doesn’t mean making a permanent record of the disability itself, just a record of what the staff can do to help. Think “Please open this patron’s DVD and CD cases for her at checkout” rather than “This patron has limited fine motor skills and lives alone, so you need to open her media cases for her.”

#8: Check the cataloger's work on non-English materials

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Most public libraries shelve their movie collection by title. If you have a collection of movies in a language other than English that is supposed to follow that convention, find out how to say “the” in that language, and make sure all your movies aren’t shelved under “The X” instead of “X” because someone couldn’t read the language they were working with. For example, in Spanish “the” is “el” or “la” (depending on the gender of the noun). You may find a lot of movies in the Es and Ls that don’t really belong there.

#5: Screen readers can't read pictures

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If you ever upload images to a library website or social media platform, see if you can figure out a way to add alt text to those images—a screen reader will read that alt text for a blind person who otherwise wouldn’t know what the image was about. This is especially important for, say, posters that include the logistical details for an event.

If you're not sure what to write, WebAIM has a good introduction to the purpose of alt text and how to use it well.

#4: Keep paths open

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Unless your library is already scheduled for renovation, you probably can’t realistically move all your shelving to create wider aisles, but have you inadvertently created choke points as a result of where you’ve set up furniture or display units? Make sure passages through these areas are wide enough for someone in a wheelchair or with a walker to comfortably navigate. As a way to test this, try pushing one of your larger book carts through the space with the long side of the cart parallel to you. If you can pass through with a cart, someone with an electric wheelchair can probably pass through too.

#3: Left-handed patrons need computers too

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Consider what it’s like as a left-handed person to try to use a public computer. Is there enough physical space on the left-hand side of the keyboard to move and use the mouse there? Does the cord configuration make switching the location of the mouse difficult? Is the option to make the right mouse button the main button available via direct shortcut on the desktop?