Putnam Library Staying In Touch With Teenage Interests

The Putnam County Library wants to make sure its keeping up with trends among teens.

Adult Services Coordinator Matt Knieling said so far the survey results show the library is inline with sought out programs like robotics and gaming. Knieling said that with so many options in life for teens to fill their free time, getting them in the door is the first step.

“Game days or art hangouts and things like that, we kinda start building a community within that group,” Knieling said. “It’s a lot easier to spin that off into educational seminars or working on fun robotics stuff that’s still a good time, but is also kind of sneakily educational.”

Knieling said the library considered this survey as a time to reset and see if the library’s programs are truly interesting to teenagers. Knieling said there is no date set to close out the survey for teens, which is available on their social media.

“These are all the programs that we were offering before,” Knieling said. “So it is nice to see we’re on the right track. There weren’t any big surprises but it’s also nice to be reinforced by what we are doing.”

Knieling said the library is working to make an effort to offer teen programs on a broader schedule. He said traditionally, offerings were based on what fit existing schedules and programs that evolved naturally.