Networking

In this world of uncertainty, social distancing, and more questions than we have answers—it’s the perfect time to network with your PLN (Professional Learning Network) on your campus/library, school district and beyond. This isn’t just about growing you PLN, which is always a good idea. This is about specifically networking and partnering up with others in your educational profession so you can achieve goals and grow as an educator. This was a goal I specifically had for myself during COVID. I wasn’t as useful while we were in quarantine as I was while on campus. Our district has been 1-2-1 iPads for a while and at the middle school level many were proficient with teaching almost all digitally. Some had to figure out Zoom, but other than that it was a smoother transition for my district than others around us.

At the beginning of distance learning in March 2020 I was feeling unwanted, listless and unimportant—until I decided to switch my mindset and goals for this time.

I really wanted to connect with other librarians and learn from them on specific areas that I feel like I lacked: learning new #edtech apps, websites, getting more certifications, book talking, Bitmoji classrooms, hosting virtual author visits, new book reviews, etc. I targeted the areas I wanted to improve on and searched out experts in those fields to learn from them. This definitely ties in with my Summer of Learning and Branding blogposts I did recently, but in this case networking is more purposeful than simply creating a librarian brand and sharing info. It’s about reaching out to those who connect with you and having goals for what you want to learn from them. The second I started my brand I was very choosy when it came to who I followed: are they a librarian, technologist or teacher? Are they an author, illustrator, book blogger, publisher, editor, etc.? Or are they an advocate for libraries and librarians? By being more careful in who I follow I’m able to weed out content I don’t need to see everyday from people who aren’t associated with my brand. I can also connect in various social medias with those who reach out to me for help and those I can reach to as well. These include: Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, Goodreads, etc. The content I put out under my name/brand is specific to the library or trends that are relatable to today’s society. I began getting a lot of engagement through those platforms. Once others engage with you can begin sharing relatable content with them, as well as provide opportunities for collaboration, share documents, and be creative together. My network has grown through my social media platforms this summer in great ways.

The first way I was able to grow my followers and who I follow specific to the librarian profession was doing a giveaway. This was not the intent when I partnered with other teachers and librarians who are ProjectLIT chapter leaders. We wanted to make sure a teacher got 22 books from this year or previous year ProjectLIT books that were diverse, inclusive and empathetic reads for his/her students. But because of the giveaway, I received a lot of educator followers. Giveaways are a good way to get started, but it shouldn’t be the ultimate goal: get followers. I see a lot of accounts that are dedicated to just that and I think for me I wanted to have quality content once I got followers. It didn’t stop at the follows for me.

I also spend time sharing out resources, if someone asks for them. I’ll happily give my knowledge and what I’ve learned to others, which was a big reason I started this blog. I’ve had a lot of success through trial and error in my nine years in the library and if I can help another librarian get genrefication off the ground or start a new social media platform or create a Bitmoji Classroom, I’ll do so happily.

To me networking is so important in our profession. For many of us we are the only person like us on a campus so we need to have other friends in the field that we can reach out to for help. I’ve made some amazing new educator friends this summer and have learned so much from them. Also thanks to COVID I don’t know when I’ll get to go to another in-person conference to network in person. Which is why it’s essential to find other like-minded people online to learn and grow from so I can be successful in my professional goals in the library. As always, if you need anything—just reach out!

How To Be A TokStar Librarian

In December 2019 my students finally convinced me to get a TikTok account and post my first video. I was very nervous mostly because I didn’t know a lot about the TikTok platform. I’ve heard them talk about it for a good 8 months before finally deciding to get my own account. And what happened next shocked me: I spent the ENTIRE holiday break in the TikTok world. I watched videos by amazingly talented dancers, choreographers, artists, crafty people, teachers who shared great classroom info, and hilarious videos by comics, actors/actresses and/or just funny people in general. I saw motivational videos that made me cry. I saw young women voice their thoughts, feelings and share their stories of abuse, neglect, sexual assault and violence. I was in awe of their strength, power and courage.

Once I got back to school in January I made it a goal to film at least one TikTok video a day. My students who once cheered me to join now called me cringe and I was 100% okay with this. Because now I was having fun making dance videos and funny recordings of voiceovers. Students started noticing and commenting on my skills—mostly positive, so much so that when we had a pep rally in February that was TikTok themed I was asked to compete in a TikTok dance off boys vs. girls. Guess who won this?

When distance learning started in March, @akbusybee reached out to me and several other TikTok librarians to ask if we wanted to form a community like the SchoolHouseRock has done with teachers. We had a Zoom meeting to introduce ourselves and then we created a Discord chat to come up with ideas. We created @tokstarlibrarians on TikTok and Instagram to create positive library-themed content. It’s so great to get ideas from these men and women in our group and to show that you can use social media in a positive, responsible way. This is the main reason I stay on TikTok, other than it being fun. I follow mostly librarians and teachers so that’s the majority of the content I see when I get on. Like any social media app, there’s going to be good and bad. If you surround yourself with like-minded content creators, it’s going to be fun and suitable environment. When people say TikTok is nothing but a bad app, I have to strongly disagree. I’ve gotten amazing professional development opportunities, as well as ideas for the library, lessons and technology from it. What I’m trying to say is: find your people. The same can be said for Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr, Snapchat, etc. I want to show students that what you put out in the world represents you and can have lasting effects. I plan on using my TikTok when I teach digital citizenship this year. Hop on! You don’t even need an account to view the app. Simply download it and start watching, but it won’t curate content that’s specific to you unless you create an account and start following people you want to see on your For You page everyday. Then the TikTok algorithm will do it’s thing and start showing you people you might want to follow based on those you already follow.

I was lucky to participate in a podcast by Librarian Influencers on my TikTok PLN, using social media in the library and branding myself in the librarian community. It was such a joy to talk to Laura about all these topics and share some goals I have for this summer and school year ahead. To be honest things haven’t been so great since March. I struggle with anxiety and everything going on with COVID-19 and the uncertainty of what the 2020-2021 school year will look like has really amped up my stress to new levels. TikTok helps. I’m able to exercise when I learn new dances, laugh at myself when I make a funny TikTok voiceover, share books & authors and get new and exciting ideas to bring back to the library when things return to normal. It’s also been a great way to stay in contact with my students. They see my videos either on TikTok or when I share them on my IG Stories and they reply all the time with positive reviews and feedback. I even had a few students come out to me on TikTok because I shared that our library was an inclusive place during June for #LGBTQIA+ month. The fact that they felt comfortable enough with me to trust me with that information means more than I can say. Using social media allows me to reach them on their level, get their jokes, know their verbiage/lingo. If I get even one student to trust me or confide in me or reach out to me in the library then all of my social media accounts are worth it.

Branding

This month has been a whirlwind of activity for me in regards to social media. I was asked to participate in a diverse book giveaway on Instagram and be a part of a librarian loop in the hopes to gaining new librarians in my PLN (professional learning network). Both events caused my following to triple in the span on a week. Up until now I’ve had several different handles for various platforms and none of them matched. At the same time I was asked to participate in a podcast for Librarian Influencers. At the end of the interview I needed to share ways for other librarians to get in touch with me. Looking at all the different names I had I realized the time had finally come to create a brand for myself to make it easier for people to find me and recognize what I am all about. This is something I’ve been wanting to do for over two years, but hadn’t been able to think of the perfect name for myself.

Finding a name was the hardest part because there are so many creative people out there! You have to make sure the name you choose for yourself hasn’t been taken by someone else on any platform and you want to make sure it accurately reflects your brand and what you want people to think of when they hear it. I ended up settling on TheNextGenLibrarian because that’s what I aspire to be: the next generation librarian for my students, teachers, campus and community. This can mean being an avid reader, proficient in #edtech, being an ambassador for various apps or websites, getting certified in different areas, being a campus leader, PD guru, knowledgable in research and fact checking, digital citizenship advocate, and so much more.

Once I had my brand the next step was to secure it on all the social media sites that I use—plus more. I was able to get @thenextgenlibrarian on TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, Goodreads, TpT, Pinterest and secure the domain name for this website. Twitter didn’t allow that many characters so I became @thenextgenlib on that platform, as well as my GMail since the longer version was taken already. Luckily I don’t have to start from scratch on TikTok, IG and Twitter. I was able to change my handle and keep all my current followers and content. If I had to start all over I don’t know that I would have made the change. I didn’t have a website for myself (only for my middle school library), nor did I have a Facebook page set up either. I went about doing both of those things because I want to make sure that everything I share on any platform is from ME—not my campus or district. That was a big reason for making the change as well. I had been sharing a lot of my opinions on my campus’ Instagram account and found that it’s just a good idea in general to remain separate from your campus and district when sharing ideas.

The downside to branding is that I lost some of my recognition. I am on the Sandhya Menon Street Team and when we do our IG lives, I was easily recognized as @oakrunlibrary. However since the change I don’t think anyone recognizes me or my account with the new name. So be aware that it might take some time to get some of that recognition back once you change over to your new handle. For the most part though, everyone has been so supportive of the brand name change on all my platforms. So now it’s important that I take it to the next level, which includes adding more social media platforms with my new brand and building a website and blog so that I can share my journey with others.

Branding isn’t the quickest thing in the world because you do have to consider all the social media accounts you want to use, as well as build a website and purchase a domain name. I did this through Google for the domain and then used SquareSpace to build the website. It’s easy to use and fairly cheap to maintain the cost of the website each month. Having one place where other librarians, educators, administrators, etc. can go to find out all about you is important so the website is a must. Next up will be business cards, stickers and more to give out at conferences and trainings I attend. Soon I want everyone to know that Amanda Hunt is synonymous with TheNextGenLibrarian! Thanks for following me on this journey!