Are Gamers Readers?

I know this seems like old information to post, but I thought my original comments (included below, although somewhat tweaked) might have been published as an editorial. Since it wasn't, I can now talk about this on my own blog.

In the September 15, 2008 issue of Library Journal, Joseph Grosso wrote "Mission Aborted?" (p.34) in which he questions if libraries have "aborted" their mission of promoting reading and have instead adopted a culture that embraces and promotes “multimedia” materials—especially gaming (materials and programs). Grosso admits that he will likely be “derided,” and indeed he was in the November 15 issue of LJ. I’ll try to be gentle in contradicting Mr. Grosso.

While I at times lament the fact that patrons aren’t always in the public library to get a literary classic, I must assure Mr. Grosso that gaming in the public libraries has promoted more reading—at least as I observed among the teens with whom I worked in my previous position as a teen specialist librarian for the Evansville Vanderburgh Public Library (EVPL) in Indiana. It was there that teens were not only offered electronic gaming events at least twice a month, but also given the opportunity to oversee those programs. Teens assisted with these programs by setting up, monitoring and cleaning up. They also developed new and highly creative ideas for spin-off programs (which kept spinning off from each other). These spin-off programs covered everything from non-electronic gaming events to a reader’s theatre where the teens presented children’s stories to younger children’s groups at the library.

As the teens realized they could take an active role in the library, they also began to view the library as their favorite place to “hang out” (in a good sense) even when no gaming events or other programs were offered. Of course, it was during those times that the teens perused the stacks and began checking out large numbers of books. In fact, at EVPL’s Central Library, where the bulk of teen programming occurred, circulation of teen (YA) reading materials (NOT electronic materials, mind you) increased over 18% from 2006 to 2007, the time period in which the gaming events b egan. Was the increased circulation of teen literature a direct result of the gaming events the library offered? I believe it was. Gaming brought the so-called “reluctant readers” into the library—a place they might not otherwise have visited. I also believe that gaming events allowed the teens to develop a special love for their library, and I am confident that the leadership these teens assumed there and the special social interactions they experienced within the library will convince those students to remain library users and supporters well into their adult years.