A Pandemic Snapshot: Libraries’ Digital Shifts and Disparities to Overcome

ABSTRACT

In the fall and winter of 2020, New America embarked on a snapshot study to gather data on how – or if – people were discovering, accessing, and using their public libraries during the COVID-19 pandemic, with a focus on materials that libraries made available online. A full report on our findings, titled Public Libraries and the Pandemic: Digital Shifts and Disparities to Overcome, was published in March 2021. This article draws heavily from that report and also includes a policy update related to passage of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act in the Fall of 2021. Analyzing data from a national survey in Fall 2020 of 2,620 people, we found mixed awareness of the public library’s online resources, a shift toward online resources, mostly positive attitudes toward the public library and its online resources, and disparities in access to and use of the public library’s online resources. This article also describes one library’s creation of a digital navigator program to support digital literacy as an example of how to overcome some of these disparities. We conclude with specific recommendations for improving inclusivity, helping community members gain affordable internet access at home so they can use their library’s online materials, and building awareness of library offerings via local organizations and schools. The aim is to leverage the lessons of the pandemic to help libraries launch more equitable ecosystems of learning across communities, providing access to knowledge, resources, and training, online and off.

KEYWORDS:

• Covid-19
• digital equity
• broadband access
• digital materials
• digital navigators
• survey
• library use

Acknowledgments

This article is primarily based upon a 2020 survey that would not have been possible without the survey expertise, smart thinking, and analytic skills of Ann Duffett of the FDR Group. Our research was also guided by a work group assembled at New America that included Paolo Balboa of the National Digital Inclusion Alliance, John Bracken of the Digital Public Library of America, Amanda Lenhart of the Data & Society Research Institute, Donnell Probst of the National Association for Media Literacy Education, and Kelvin Watson, formerly of the Broward County Library in Florida and now at Clark County Public Library in Las Vegas, NV. We are grateful for their advice and ideas throughout the project and their review of the final results. We thank Riker Pasterkiewicz and Fabio Murgia of New America’s communications team for their invaluable support in producing the graphics. We also thank Deborah Fallows, Kristina Ishmael, and Sabrina Detlef for their editorial review and guidance. This study was funded by a grant from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation; we are grateful to the foundation for the opportunity to embark on this study.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Nearly all questions in the survey were explicitly about public libraries; a subset of questions asked respondents if they used a website or app from a college or university library or a K-12 school library. For more, see our sidebar on General Public Survey Respondents.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation [2020-13984].

Notes on contributors

Lisa Guernsey

Lisa Guernsey is a senior fellow, strategic advisor, and former director of Teaching, Learning & Tech in the Education Policy Program at New America. She has written two books on technology and learning, as well as several reports and book chapters on media mentorship and media literacy in public libraries and schools, most recently contributing a chapter on media mentorship to A Librarian’s Guide to Engaging Families in Learning (ABC CLIO, 2021).

Sabia Prescott

Sabia Prescott is a former policy analyst in the Education Policy Program at New America (where she worked when this article was written) and is now a Senior Policy and Legislative Analyst at the Campaign for Our Shared Future.

Claire Park

Claire Park is a policy analyst with New America’s Open Technology Institute, where she researches and writes on a number of technology policy issues including broadband access and competition, as well as privacy.