Management and Leadership Discussion #3: Observational Research at George Mason Regional Library
21 February 2024
On Saturday, February 17, from about 10:30 AM to 12:00 PM, I lingered in George Mason Regional Library, located in Annandale, Virginia and part of Fairfax County Public Libraries (FCPL), for my observational research. I actually try to avoid using George Mason as a subject for assignments, since I personally know a handful of staff currently working there, but coincidence at around had that it would be the most convenient one to survey.
One of our readings for this module is a treatise towards accommodating as many users as possible, in the form of a checklist of principles that adhere to modern standards of accessibility, which is aptly called Universal Design. As the author writes in their introduction, libraries should strive to fulfill to be accessible; not just for the average user, but "for people with a broad range of abilities, disabilities, and other characteristics—such as age, reading ability, learning style, language, culture, and others" (Burgstahler, 2018).
While there are a few shortcomings keeping the branch from fully adhering to these principles (though I'm not sure if I know of any library that can check every box), George Mason does check the majority of them off. That's in spite of design choices that almost seem to completely disregard them—first and foremost of these would be exemplified before a would-be visitor even steps inside. George Mason is housed in a single-story 27,000 square foot building, at the rear of an enormous 175-space parking lot, far away from the turnpike it resides on, with a line of trees on the curb partially obscuring it from street view. With only a single entrance for visitors on one side of the building, it might appear much too tiny for anyone parked in the back of a plot that is much too large—and yet the parking lot is designed to direct visitors with diagonal, one-way rows that are oriented towards the entrance.
Inside, I wasn't able to find any maps or other signage explaining the layout, or at least one clustered near a bunch of other informational displays or pamphlets—though admittedly, I overlooked looking for any during my visit. However, perhaps even moreso than other libraries I've visited, George Mason might not necessarily need one. There are a lot of things vying for a visitor's attention just past the vestibule—one of the library's two display cases and both of the branch's singular meeting and conference rooms in the minimal foyer, new adult fiction and nonfiction just to the left once a visitor is on the floor proper. But, the very first thing one is likely to notice is the information desk a short stroll in front of them, staffed by two librarians willing to guide patrons to whatever section is requested.
Further into the building, the lowered ceiling combined with the tall and plentiful shelves housing the collection can cause confusion. This is compounded in part by the minimal differentiation in design between sections—while the juvenile area has shelves and seating at a lower height and some playful decorations and a slightly raised ceiling compared to the rest of the stacks, the only way to tell sections apart from a distance are red-on-white signs hanging above each section. I could be making this out to be more than it is, though. There are clear sightlines outside the stacks and plenty of light, either natural from the raised roof of the front-facing area or the long rows of florescents further inside, and since the entire library is spread over a single floor without any obscure rooms or collections on the far side, there isn't much that's easily missed.
Despite the information desk's centrality, activity and questions during my visit were much dwarfed by George Mason's other service point: the circulation desk, located directly across from the new adult books on the east side of the building. Of course, it would follow that the desk devoted to the foundational function of the library would be the most heavily used, though the actual ratio was a little surprising. As I chatted with an old coworker for about four or five minutes, patrons with actual inquiries came to ask for assistance four times, while the staff at the information desk received none (that I noticed, anyway). I wasn't able to get a full count afterwards, as I was primarily focused on another assignment for 677, though from what I can tell the ratio of questions was very much weighed in favor of the circulation desk.
One other draw to George Mason are the technologies available for use. In terms of typical public-access hardware, there are 6 computers dedicated to browsing FCPL's OPAC scattered around, 24 conventional Windows 10 stations equipped with Microsoft Office clustered a ways past the information desk, and a hybrid printer-scanner able to print in black in white or color. Unique and/or rarely seen at other FCPL branches are its 3D printer, a specialized early literacy computer in the juvenile section. Most notably, George Mason boasts its own self-styled Memory Depot, a dedicated station with a flatbed scanner, magnifier, VHS converter, audio cassette converter, and floppy disk converter (Fairfax County, n.d.); all intended to transfer older format materials a person might still possess into modern formats.
Overall, though it seems as if George Mason can be quite lively, I found it subdued—my friend assured me this Saturday was quieter than normal, which is definitely a phenomenon that happens at my branch, too. None of the aforementioned issues seemed too glaring a weakness, save for one thing that might be easy to overlook: the complete lack of a dedicated teen space. I'm sure this is a necessary tradeoff given the library's clientele: as far as I can tell there were no adolescents in the branch the entire time I was there, but plenty of adults with their younger children. Perhaps even more notably, a man sat down at the table directly behind me to read a Korean newspaper and was still there after I left; and there are a lot of aspects to George Mason unmentioned here that oriented towards multilingual populations. Such is the picking-and-choosing dilemmas when attempting to accommodate people with limited amount of space, I suppose.
References
Burgstahler, S. (2018). Equal access: Universal Design of libraries. DO-IT. https://www.washington.edu/doit/equal-access-universal-design-libraries
Fairfax County. (n.d.). George Mason Regional Library. Retrieved February 21, 2024, from: https://www.fairfaxcounty.gov/library/branches/george-mason-regional
Wilson, J. (2023). Tysons-Pimmit's main floor. [Photograph]. CC BY-SA.