Giving Teens the Tools of Empowerment By Laini Bostian s the Youth Services Coordinator at Culpeper County Library, I am familiar with the challenges involved in recruiting teen volunteers. Early in 2012, attendance at our teen programs began to decrease. Although still well attended we had been seeing higher participation. When only two teens registered for an annual planning and general input program I grew concerned. I knew from experience that it was critical to include teens in the planning process for programs geared toward them. After doing some research, which included several academic articles confirming the benefits of teen advisor groups, I set about establishing one. March Madness In March of 2012 we developed a cupcake decorating contest, a book club, and a Hunger Games extravaganza. It was necessary to schedule additional meetings to accomplish the planning for these events. After some time, the advisors expressed concern about adding more meetings to their already overloaded schedules. After several months, we kept the teens in charge of event planning and left the preparation and final tweaking of ideas to the library personnel. This structure enabled us to limit committee meetings to one per month. Putting Teens to Work The Teen Advisor Group is working toward fulfilling Assets for Healthy Growth and Development, as published by Search Institute and adopted by the Library of Virginia for consideration when planning teen events. Among our events are opportunities for positive interactions with other teens in a safe environment, and for participating in A quality programs regularly. Early on it was apparent that the teen advisors needed training on brainstorming and running effective meetings. While there is an adult present at each meeting, the teens are empowered to take charge. The leadership training has enabled them to run meetings more effectively. Overall leadership skills have increased an impressive amount. Programming also includes events that benefit teens outside of the meeting room, such as a training on how best to interact with teens on the autism spectrum so that they could fully participate in events, and make new friends. Program results The overall results of our efforts have been extremely positive. Program attendance has increased and teenagers who had not previously attended teen events are now participating due to program diversification. Teenagers who attend programs indicate on surveys that they enjoy meeting new people, learning new things, and are having fun. Advisors have shown enormous growth in taking responsibility for being punctual, completing assigned tasks, communicating consistently, behaving in accordance with the Rules of Volunteer Etiquette, and helping out at all programs, including children’s story times. We are accepting applications from those who want to join our TAG group, but there are a limited number of advisor spots open. Anyone interested can contact me, Laini Bostian, at 540-825-8691 or lbostian@cclva.org. Laini Bostian is the Youth Services Coordinator at the Culpeper County Library. Recent Culpeper Library Teen Events 2013 • Issue 2 Piedmont Family Magazine 9