The Library Association's Early Years Survey
July 2001
1. Introduction
Early years have been a traditionally strong area of activity
for public libraries. This is reflected in the 80% of UK public
libraries who offer Under 5s sessions Creaser, Claire A Survey
of Library services to Schools and Children in the UK 1999–2000
LISU Loughborough University, November 2000.
This activity has greatly increased following the expansion
of the early years sector as a result of the government’s
childcare strategies and the announcement of the £1 billion
Sure Start programme.
Beyond the impact on the community, Early Years library services
are significant to public libraries for four reasons:
- They are a clearly identifiable way in which libraries are
delivering key government policy (social inclusion, education,
attempts to alleviate child poverty)
- They are attracting high level commercial sector partnership
support
- Early years are typical of new areas of library development
which are being facilitated and supported by a range of partnerships,
rather than through core library funding – raising concerns
about sustainability
- They are an example of the way in which public library authorities
are able to respond to neighbourhood initiatives and focus on
working with specific communities.
In May 2000 the Library Association produced the results of a
survey of public library involvement with the government’s
Sure Start programme. This gave details of how 36 authorities
in trail blazer or second round Sure Start authorities were working
as partners in delivering Sure Start. The details proved useful
both in terms of disseminating best practise within the library
community and as data for advocacy.
In April 2001 the increased awareness of the significance of
libraries services to children under the age of 4 and their families
prompted The Library Association to repeat and extend the survey.
A questionnaire was sent to all heads of children’s library
services in England as part of The Library Association’s
“Early Years Advocacy Pack” which aimed to support library
services in Sure Start partnerships and as members of their local
EYCDP.
The pack was also published on The Library Association website
and it was possible to answer the questionnaire online. This was
the first time that this had been attempted in a Library Association
survey. The fact that over half of the responses were received
online was seen as a sign of its success.
Responses were received from 88 English library authorities –a
response rate of 65%. 4 authorities requested that their responses
be treated confidentially. An additional 3 responses were received
from other authorities not within the English regions (2 from
Wales and one from the Channel Islands). These have been used
within the report – where appropriate. The responses were
equally distributed across the regions and were equally representative
of all types of local authorities.
2. Early Years Librarians
31 (34%) library authorities had a recognisable early years specialist.
12 of these librarians have a specific to Bookstart or Bookstart
Plus in their job title, suggesting the centrality of the programme
to libraries’ early years work.
One authority (Derby City) mentioned 3 specialist posts –
a Bookstart Plus Education Action Zone librarian, a Bookstart
Plus Sure Start librarian and a Books for Babies Librarian. South
Tyneside also recorded 3 library based early years posts.
Sure Start was the most popular funding source for these posts
(9 posts), library funding was supporting 5 and SRB funding was
named by 5.
Some of the library job titles explicitly linked libraries with
literacy, for instance Bromley’s Early Years Literacy Development
Officer.
Against a background of the static or even gradually decreasing
numbers of children’s specialist posts1 Creaser, Claire A
Survey of Library services to Schools and Children in the UK 1999–2000
LISU Loughborough University, November 2000
1, the widespread creation of these new posts dealing specifically
with early years work, which have been financed by recent funding
streams, demonstrates the importance of this area of work to the
future of children’s librarianship in England. It also suggests
an emerging pattern of specialist librarians’ posts, and
perhaps of the children’s specialism itself, where specialist
work is more closely linked to specific projects and defined audiences
rather than more generally at the young client base within a library
authority.
3. Early Years Childcare Development Partnerships (EYCDPs)
It is increasingly apparent that the government see the EYCDPs
as crucial strategic groups for rolling out their early years
policies. 48 (54%) of the responding library authorities were
members of their EYCDP. Involvement in some cases was significant:
“Yes, I am chair… This places books and libraries in
a prominent position.“ Only one authority (Essex) raised
concerns about the effectiveness of their EYCDP. 4 respondents
associated non-membership with a failure of the EYCDP to recognise
the relevance of the libraries:
“It was decided by the partnership that libraries were not
relevant” (Staffordshire)
Other authorities indicated that the Early Years Advocacy Pack
had given them a new awareness of the significance of EYCDPs and
new strategies to gain membership.
“Hope to use advocacy pack as a lever. Have not been involved
in creation of existing EYCDP – hope to change this”
(London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham)
The most common benefit to libraries from membership of EYCDP
was felt to be the opportunities created by partnership working.
In some places, such as Dorset, EYCDP membership had enabled early
participation in Sure Start.
12 authorities talked of directly benefiting from resources accessed
through their EYCDP
- Funding for browser boxes for 19 clinics and Reading Carnival”
(North Yorkshire)
- Funding for a Bookstart post. Refurbishment of 9 meeting rooms
in libraries where Early Years training is held …”
(West Sussex)
- Part funding for “Books Can Help” booklet on situation
picture books” (Wolverhampton)
The most frequently noted library contribution to an EYCDP was
in supporting information provision. 19 library authorities were
contributing to their partnerships in this way. Frequently this
was by membership of the information subgroup. Some library authorities
(Solihull and Southampton for example) manage the EYCDP’s
Children’s Information Service.
Libraries are also offering support to their EYCDPs through training
other providers in issues around children’s reading and books
(4 authorities). In West Sussex the library’s role as an
agent of social inclusion means that the Head of Children’s
Library Services chairs the EYDCP’s inclusion subgroup.
Librarians are becoming members of their EYCDPs as a result of
their skills in information management, literacy development and
in supporting inclusion. The benefits to many authorities are
significant both in terms of accessing
funding streams and in the development of strategic partnerships.
4. Bookstart
The questionnaire sought to identify to what extent involvement
in Bookstart had provided a lever for the strategic development
of libraries early years services, by developing new partnerships
and through embedding it within other projects.
83 authorities (90%) said Bookstart had enabled them to develop
new partnerships and embed libraries work within the Early Years
sector. Only 4 authorities felt that this had not happened for
them.
Partnerships with health were the most frequently identified.
They were mentioned by 22 (24%) of authorities. Many talked about
Bookstart supporting partnerships with a wide range of health
providers – “health visitors, speech therapists, special
needs HVs….” (Lancashire).
Others saw Bookstart as being the central activity, which had
enabled libraries in their area to engage strategically with The
early years agenda: “Bookstart has enabled us to secure a
place on the EYDCP and Sure Start partnerships” (Bromley).
In Northamptonshire Bookstart has enabled partnerships “with
most of the major organisations involved in early years”.
Other library authorities had developed closer links with education
through Bookstart. Birmingham libraries work with Education on
a sister project:
“Flying Start” takes books for babies to hostels, works
closely with health, produces book bags for parents etc. (they
do say imitation is the greatest form of flattery!)”
Other authorities talked about developed links with adult and
family education programmes.
“Better links with local college – family literacy
coordinator is on our steering group (Solihull).”
Overall most authorities would seem to agree with Essex who explained:
“If Bookstart is hugely powerful with a range of partners
and has won a lot of additional funding for us because:
- It impacts on ALL children
- We can prove the impact
The fact that Bookstart has been evaluated and that its impact
has been recognised and identified by research, is one of the
main reasons why it has proved to be such a significant partnership-development
project for libraries. Responses demonstrate libraries confidence
in Bookstart: They feel they have a robust and respected project
with which they can approach partners.
5. Creating a library service context for Bookstart
Many library authorities have developed their Bookstart programme,
embedding it in a wider framework of early years literacy activity.
Bookstart is frequently acting as a lynch pin for a range of broader
language and learning work. The most common sign of this is the
development of “Bookstart Plus” activities.
58 (63%) of responding library authorities described additional
Bookstart extension activities. By far the most common of these
was Bookstart Plus, offered by 36 (39%) of authorities. This project
normally involves follow up activities focused on additonal book
gifting at 18 months. Bookstart Plus was generally described as
being focused on particular areas within the authority, usually
corresponding to Sure Start, EAZ, or SRB areas:
“Yes – [Bookstart Plus] in the first of our Sure Start
zones and hope to introduce the scheme in our second ...Trying
to sustain and extend the year 2 EAZ based book giving project
and funding is being sought from the Neighbourhood Renewal Fund.”
(Blackburn)
Sure Start was cited as the funding source for Bookstart extension
activities in 17 (19%) of responding authorities. A huge range
of other funding was cited including EYCDP, Health Action Zones,
the charity Reading Is Fundamental, EAZ, SRB, Standards Funding
and local sponsorship. Library funding was mentioned by 12 (13%)
of responding local authorities.
It is interesting to compare this with the funding picture uncovered
by a similar recent Library Association survey of public library
study support activity – a comparable area of expansion for
libraries’ services to young people. This uncovered a similarly
wide range of funding. However it significantly revealed a much
greater number of library services directly funding activities.
36% reported an ongoing commitment by the library authority to
resourcing study support activities. The Library Association Study
Support in public Libraries: The Results of a Library Association
Questionnaire. June 2000
This suggests that the current pattern of libraries development
of early years services is reliant on external funding to a far
greater extent than other areas of service development. It raises
the question to what extent would authorities step in to core
fund this area of activity, when and if external funding sources
dry up. There is a need for continuing advocacy at national and
regional levels to support the mainstreaming of libraries’
early years work.Apart from the Bookstart Plus activities, Bookstart
extension projects reflected the range of partners that Bookstart
had allowed libraries to develop, especially with health and education:
- Librarians have visited Health Centres and Health Visitors
have held clinics in the library” East Riding of Yorkshire
- We have developed Road to Reading with Community Education,
where the skills of parents are addressed in particular wards”
Durham
- Have also run courses for parents in partnership with health
and the adult college” Barking and Dagenham
One authority (Hillingdon) talked about using Sainsburys - the
national sponsor of Bookstart – as a local sponsor for developing
additional Bookstart based activities.
5. Libraries and Sure Start
Developing libraries’ awareness and engagement with Sure
Start projects was one of the key aims of the The Library Association’s
Early Years Advocacy Pack. The 92 authorities which responded
identified 151 Sure Start programmes within their authorities
and named 138 projects which they were partners in. This suggests
a very high level of library involvement in Sure Start - involvement
of around 92%.
5.1 How libraries are helping Sure Start
Responses indicated a rich variety of ways in which libraries
were delivering Sure Start. This reflects the range of local situations
and the imaginative ways in which libraries are responding. The
main areas of activity can be grouped around 5 main headings:
1. Bookstart extension projects
Using the universal Bookstart entitlement as the starting point
for a more targeted literacy intervention programme, these projects
build on the links - particularly between libraries and health
– established by the Bookstart programme. Other authorities
were using the statistics collected for monitoring Bookstart as
data for the creation of local Sure start targets. 22 authorities
talked about using Bookstart plus or Bookstart-linked projects
to deliver Sure Start:
- “Bookstart Plus in 2 districts – gifting at 18 months
and 3 years” (Liverpool)
- “Bookstart ad reading promotion statistics of library
membership and parents reading to children from the Bookstart
Questionnaire” (Lancashire)
- “Deliver Bookstart Plus project for children aged 2 linked
to Sure Start Centre in Penge” (Bromley)
2. Supporting projects with library stock and librarians’
skills in early years and family literacy
15 authorities cited this as a way in which their service was
supporting the delivery of Bookstart.
- “Advice and support for parents on sharing books. Running
storytelling courses for parents” (Enfield)
- “Supplying stock/storytelling sessions” (Norfolk)
- “We hope to deliver training about the values of books
etc.” (Suffolk)
- “Training activities for parents” (Manchester)
3. Project management
8 authorities talked about their contribution to the management
of their local Sure Start projects as a key area of activity:
- “Management Core Group Member, currently Chair of Parent
Group” (Torbay)
- “On Steering Committee [producing outline plan]”
(Coventry)
- “On interview panel for Sure Start manager” (Lancashire)
4. Workshops and events
13 authorities referred to hosting or organising events, workshops
or reading groups as part of their strategy to deliver Sure Start:
• “Family Reading Groups” (Halton)
• “Workshops to promote literacy” (Croydon)
• “Staging community-wide events in library” (Islington)
5. Designated post
Recognising the limited capacity within most library services
for intensive support, many Sure Start projects are using libraries
as the base for dedicated posts, many of which are specifically
for a Sure Start librarian. Other programmes are using ideas and
language familiar from the Reader Development movement to create
posts to help deliver Sure Start. Blackburn with Darwen has a
full time Sure Start Reader Development Officer. Hartlepool has
a Reader in Residence who has been appointed to promote literacy
to families in the authorities two Sure Start areas.
6. Creation of special mobile collections
Book buses and designated mobiles, which take the library out
of the library and into the heart of hard to reach communities,
were mentioned by 7 respondents.
- “...Setting up a mobile book/toy library to visit early
years settings in the area” (Staffordshire)
- “A mobile library which also provides access to the internet
within the Sure Start area” (Somerset)
- “Visits from the Bookbus to the [Sure Start] Centre”
(Southampton)
Because Sure Start activities are generated by each community’s
needs, many of the most imaginative library activities are “one
offs”. For instance NE Lincolnshire described “a video
aimed at encouraging library use by parents of reception class
children which will be given out free in a library pack, beginning
in September”.
Sure Start capital funding had allowed the enlargement and refurbishment
of Church Street Children’s Library in Westminster.
However, some authorities did qualify their answers and indicated
barriers which they had experienced to becoming partners in Sure
Start projects. Communications failures, under valuing of libraries’
contribution and capacity within libraries needed for developing
partnerships was cited:
- “Not a member, probably because we are not a member of
EYCPD (Warrington)
- “They don’t seem to know what they are supposed
to be doing” (Nottingham)
- “The library service has too few children’s librarians”
(reason for not being fully involved – Oxfordshire)
5.2 How Sure Start is helping libraries
Library authorities were asked how they felt that their involvement
in Sure Start was benefiting early years library provision. By
far the most frequently cited benefit (by 51 respondents) was
an increased ability to target hard to reach children within the
community “to ensure social inclusion by...enabling us to
develop libraries in more child and people friendly ways by listening
to what people have to say” (Norfolk). Opening access to
resources (staffing, stock and capital) which would allow this
to happen was highlighted as a benefit by 13 authorities.
14 library authorities talked about how their involvement with
Sure Start had boosted the profile of their early years services
within the wider library service, across the community and with
partners. “Library Services are now recognised as an essential
part of joined-up childcare early years services in Penge”
(Bromley). It brings libraries to the attention of others who
might not have considered what we have to offer”(Westminster).
The benefits of partnership working were referred to by 17 library
services. Somerset saw this as happening in three areas:
- Gaining a range of advocates through partnershi
- Extending opportunities for joint approach to provision
- Increasing knowledge re:client group and the role of other
agencies.
Thurrock described how this increased knowledge of partners benefited
parents who could be referred to partner services by library staff
with a clearer idea of what the partner agency could offer.
6. Children in situations of deprivation not being targetted
by Sure Start
Even when fully rolled out, Sure Start will only be accessing
a third of children in poverty in England. The questionnaire asked
libraries how they were specifically attempting to access children
in situations of rural deprivation or non-geographically defined
situations of deprivation.
47 authorities (51%) talked about strategies. Only 12 of these
were related to EAZ, HAZ or SRB funding, suggesting that most
fall outside the zoning patterns of support favoured by the government,
and that libraries are eager to explore new models to address
children in deprivation.
Many of the approaches described were exciting and innovative
for example:
- Leicestershire - services being developed by outreach worker
and librarians in rural areas and deprived areas where the overall
ward does not match deprivation factors. In particular for travellers,
show people, refugee and asylum seekers and looked after children.
- Blackburn with Darwen – Early years looked after children
being target as part of the Right to Read programme
- Nottingham – Books for Babies outreach worker to target
target areas were take up in literacy schemes is low (specifically
minority ethnic communities and mothers in hostels).
- Northamptonshire – library work with traveller health
visitors
- Oxfordshire – a reading bus targets areas of rural deprivation
- Hampshire – training for staff in targeting these issues
- Birmingham – Bookstart outreach to 22 hostels, work with
pregnant school girls and teenage mothers
By far the most frequently mentioned strategy was Bookstart.
10 authorities referred to the universal Bookstart entitlement
to free books as a strategy for libraries to reach children living
in deprivation outside of zoned target areas. This raises the
concern that if national Bookstart funding breaks down, and the
project becomes reliant on local funding zones, then the fundamental
role of Bookstart as a strategy to break out of zoned areas will
be defeated,
7. Conclusions
Public libraries engagement with the early years agenda is wide
spread and varied: 34% of library authorities responding to the
questionnaire now have a recognisable early years specialist;
91% of the Sure Start projects within responding authorities include
the library service as partners. Libraries work with early years
does not follow one particular template and even within an authority
different models are being used in different areas. This reflects
the bottom up nature of the early years agenda and suggests that
libraries are able to address community and neighbourhood strategies
which subsist within the wider library authority. Libraries appreciate
that Sure Start has offered them a unique opportunity to effectively
target some of the hardest to reach families within the community
through solid partnership projects.
However challenges remain: Despite the widespread successful
library involvement with EYCDPs, 46% of library authorities responding
to the questionnaire were not members. Recent government initiatives
indicate that the Partnerships will have increasing strategic
importance in the delivery of children’s services. Libraries
membership of EYCDPs will therefore be a significant factor in
maintaining libraries’ new found significance within early
years services. Many libraries who are working well within their
EYCDPs have found that their skills as information managers have
been as attractive to the partnerships as their roles as early
years literacy experts.
The expansion of libraries’ early years activity is supported
almost entirely by non core library funding. In common with public
libraries development of study support services, a wide variety
of community partnership funding opportunities are being harnessed
to support this work. However the relatively low level of core
library funding for early years activity suggests that advocacy
is required to support the mainstreaming of early years work within
English public library services.
Bookstart is a key element within libraries’ early years
activity. Many authorities feel that its sound research base vindicates
their work with the very young. It has created partnerships, which
initiatives such as Sure Start have built on. It has positioned
libraries as key agents of early years literacy and pre-literacy
support. Bookstart is also being used as a strategy to achieve
the targets of these zoned initiatives.
Social inclusion is seen as one of the most valuable facets of
Bookstart. It is a key early years literacy strategy in counties
which do not have any areas receiving the intensive support which
Sure Start delivers. It is an important strategy for libraries
aiming to address children in situations of deprivation who live
outside the zoned areas of support. There is a strong concern
that Bookstart shouldn’t get trapped in zones. National coverage
has ensured that all children have benefited from Bookstart in
an approach which mirrors the fundamental inclusivity of libraries:
as every child has been entitled to a library card, so every child
has been entitled to book ownership through Bookstart. The challenge
will be to maintain this characteristic if national funding for
the programme is not forthcoming, before the anticipated support
from NOF in 2004.
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