A Night Out at the Library for Everyone by TTW Contributor Justin Hoenke

I’m very excited to share our new NIGHT OUT program that we’ll be running next month at the Chattanooga Public Library.  It’s a simple idea, but it is one of the best library programs I’ve put together. Why?  Let me tell you.

Basically it goes like this: while parents and guardians enjoy an evening at our June 5th event featuring New York Times Bestselling Author Jeff Shaara on The 4th Floor of the Chattanooga Public Library, their kids, tweens, and teens can hang out on the 2nd Floor (without their parents/guardians) and enjoy all that the 2nd Floor of the Chattanooga Public Library has to offer.

Parents and guardians get to have a night out. Kids, Tweens, and Teens get to have a night out.  Everyone is hanging out in the library, and everyone leaves the library happy.

Why am I so excited about this? Because I feel that it represents a shift in how we are approaching programs.  To make something like this work, all parts of the library (including our great Friends of the Library group who are sponsoring this event) need to work together.  The adult program has to be all set up and ready to go.  The kid/tween/teen program has to be planned and executed properly.  We need to make sure we’re sufficiently staffed.  We need our security team to do their best to help us monitor all things on the 2nd Floor.  A program like this is truly a library wide effort.

Plus, it all brings it back to our community.  It is important for the public library to recognize what all of their community needs out of programming.  For parents and guardians, simply not having to worry about childcare for an hour or two can be a big deal in deciding whether or not they’ll visit the library.  Hopefully with this idea, we will see adults who may not have considered it a possibility to attend a library event all of a sudden enjoying our programs on a regular basis.  Do what your community needs you to do.