March 25th Update on Pierson Library Services

• LIBRARY CLOSED - Curbside Pickup Discontinued
• Wifi on 24/7
• eResources expanded
• Daily Youth story times and Adult online discussion groups to launch next week

In order to comply with Governor Scott’s “Stay home, stay safe” directive, Pierson Library is closing curbside pick-up services as of 5pm today.  While it is difficult for us to not offer physical books to patrons, we agree that staff and patrons need to stay home and stay safe as much as possible so that the burden and exposure for essential personnel remains as low as possible.

We ask that you hold onto any materials you currently have until the building reopens, if at all possible.

Our Wifi signal will stay on 24/7, so if you are out on an essential trip and need wifi access, you may park in one of the spots close to the library to connect from the car.

Staff have been busy preparing for the eventuality that the building might need to be closed, and have assembled a suite of online services to keep Shelburne reading and keep us connected.

What will this look like?  Clearly one of the best things we can do right now is sink into an educational, enjoyable read: here are some things we will be doing to help patrons access materials:

Online resources:  If you have already set up an account through the Pierson Library you can check out ebooks and audio books through our collection of Overdrive eBooks.  Go the www.piersonlibrary.org/elibrary for a link to this service.   If you don’t already have an account or don’t know how to use your account, you can request a log in from our staff by emailing circulation@shelburnevt.org.  Please be patient, we may be getting more requests than usual!  You can also get many older ebooks for free at https://www.gutenberg.org/.

Through a generous donation of the Friends of Pierson Library, we will begin purchasing additional titles in Overdrive next week.  These titles will only be available if you log in first, so please log in to your account and then search for what you might need.

We’ve also made thousands of children’s eBooks and eAudiobooks available through a generous donation from Tumblebooks.  Their entire suite of databases, including math books and books especially selected for tweens and teens, can be found by going to piersonlibrary.org/elibrary and scrolling down.

Finally, on the same piersonlibrary.org/elibrary site, you’ll find links to two wonderful learning databases: Universal Class and LearningExpress Library.  These two new databases offer online learning opportunities for high school students, professionals, and everyday folks looking to learn a new skill.  There are many test-prep and career continuing education options here, enough to keep you busy and learning for some time.

Keeping Readers Connected

Starting some time next week, the library will begin offering once a day reading events on alternating days for kids and adults.

Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays the library will offer an online discussion for adults on an article, short story or literary essay that is freely available to the public.  This discussion will be led by a member of the library staff and anyone in the community will be able to log in to participate: more details to be announced shortly!

Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Saturdays the library will offer a virtual story time from one of the familiar faces at the Pierson: Miss Katie, Miss Inger, Miss Mary Catherine and Mr. Rob.  Some of these storytimes will even be interactive – kids can sing along and see/hear others!  More details to be announced shortly!

Speaking of details, the library will maintain communication through our website, Front Porch Forum, our Facebook page, Shelburne News, and our E-newsletter/Emails.  You can sign up for that E-newsletter on our home page, piersonlibrary.org .  We will update our phone message with vital information, but we will not be able to check messages regularly, so if you call 985-5124 it may take a while for us to get back in touch.

Please know that we are not taking the action of closing the building lightly, and we are constantly monitoring recommendations and news.  Librarians across the state are discussing best practices and exchanging ideas on how to meet the needs of our communities in this rapidly developing situation. We hope that before long we will look back on this time and wonder if we overreacted, but we do not want to look back on this time and regret having underreacted.