#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 Showing off outdated, unattractive materials sends a message of “the library doesn’t actually care about serving the people in this group” and choosing things that reinforce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.

#12: Let people bring their belongings

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Check your library’s code of conduct for a rule about large bags in the library. Many public libraries have a prohibition against bringing anything larger than a backpack into the building. If your library has such a policy, can it be softened, or can your staff talk about using discretion when enforcing it? Many people who are homeless don’t have anywhere to leave their belongings during the day and thus must carry them with them wherever they go. For people in that situation, telling someone that they can’t bring their suitcase in is telling them that they have to choose between leaving all their worldly goods unguarded and using the library.

#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.”

#10: Your ILS probably doesn't need to know everyone's gender identity

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When you sign people up for library cards, do you collect their gender? If you do and you don’t use that information for anything, stop asking for it! If you do use that information somehow, make sure there is some option other than “male” and “female.” If you think you only have space for three options (and you probably can make more space), perhaps you can add “prefer not to identify” or “none of these.” If you collect gender information only as a proxy for preferred form of address, consider asking for that explicitly instead.

#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.

#6: Your single-user restroom is probably underused

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If you have a single-user restroom, how is it labelled? If, as is often the case, it’s specially designated for a certain group ('family restroom', 'handicapped only,' etc.) consider if it would cause problems for you to open up this restroom to everyone. It's not only one fewer door for anyone who struggles with door handles to have to deal with, it also may make the difference between whether a trans or gender nonconforming person feels comfortable using the library or not.

#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?