Journal article
The Big Picture of YA Services Analyzing the Results of the 2012 PLA PLDS Survey
Young adult library services, Vol.11(3), pp.13-18
01 Apr 2013
Abstract
Beginning in 1988 and commissioned annually by ALA's Public Library Association (PLA), the PLA Public Library Data Service (PLDS) asks US and Canadian public libraries to answer survey questions relating to library collections, expenditures, staffing, and services.1 In 2007, and again in 2012, the survey included a special section with questions relating to Y A services.2 This article will summarize and analyze the results of the 2012 PLDS YA services survey and compare them with the results from the 2007 survey to paint a broad picture of the current state of public library services for young adults.3 General Findings from the 2012 Survey In 2012, postcards and reminders were mailed to 9,206 public libraries in the United States and Canada asking for voluntary completion of the survey. On the positive side, during fiscal year 2011, together the responding libraries spent $47,453,083 on YA collections, circulated 64,577,181 YA materials, and held 177,413 Y A programs attended by 2,896,898 youth.5 Based on these figures, it appears that just this small subset of public libraries together are reaching a significant portion of the broader target population, the roughly seventeen million secondary school students in the United States and Canada combined.6 Were spending, collections, and programming figures available for all 9,766 libraries, the portion of the target population reached would likely be much higher.
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Details
- Title
- The Big Picture of YA Services Analyzing the Results of the 2012 PLA PLDS Survey
- Creators
- Denise E Agosto
- Publication Details
- Young adult library services, Vol.11(3), pp.13-18
- Publisher
- American Library Association; Chicago
- Resource Type
- Journal article
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- Information Science (Informatics)
- Identifiers
- 991014976813204721