SMP Library: Innovation beyond traditional roles

By COLIN MURPHEY
The audience at the Franklin Rotary Club meeting was treated to a special presentation Tuesday about a parish entity that has modernized their operations to enhance the patron experience, help community members with a wide variety of services and is well into the process of preserving the history of the region.
Featuring a main facility in Franklin and six branches, the St. Mary Parish Library system has updated the options on their websites to include features that not only help distribute library materials but also encompass a wide variety of applications that meet the role of a traditional library in a modern way.
With a website that includes applications designed to provide users with tools to trace ancestors to help finding a job to continuing education and even one that allows the user to look at an issue of the Banner-Tribune from the 1800s, the St. Mary Parish Library system is continuing to make themselves relevant in an age where almost any information can be found with a simple internet search.
Branch Manager Connie Durocher said at the Rotary luncheon that the way libraries are accomplishing this is by making online options a priority. She said the website can be accessed with any device by simply utilizing a users’ existing library card. She mentioned one feature, Flipster, that allows users to access digital versions of popular magazines.
“How many of you have stacks and stacks of old magazines piled around the house and don’t know what to do with them once you’ve read them?” Durocher asked. “You can access magazines and prioritize them by articles. Anything from home gardening to golfing to health and fitness…there’s a lot of magazines on there.”
In addition to features that many libraries have caught on to over the years including online interlibrary loan services, downloadable e-books and audio books as well as access to thousands of online databases, the St. Mary Parish Library website features options designed for young readers and there’s even an option that allows a user to learn a new language on their own time.
Durocher said the “Pronunciator” application allows a card holder to learn one of 80 available languages and it won’t rush the user through the various lessons.
“You can learn a new language with the click of a mouse,” Durocher said. “Also, you can bookmark where the lesson left off and you can start again whenever and it saves it for you. It’s a lot of fun.”
A new option, “Archives from the Past,” that Durocher said she was particularly excited about, allows a library user to nearly access every page of every issue of the Banner-Tribune from the 1890s to 2003.
And if it’s often been said throughout history (at least within journalism circles) that newspapers have traditionally provided “a first rough draft of history,” then the archive tool on the St. Mary Parish Library website could provide users with the opportunity to decide for themselves whether the journalists got it right. Or just find an old wedding notice for a relative.
Regardless, Durocher said the option to use old issues of the local paper for research was a fascinating opportunity.
“I can’t tell you how excited I am about this,” Durocher said. “It’s so exciting to be able to find information like this and I can’t wait to share this. It will show you the entire newspaper.”
The website for the St. Mary Parish Library system is www.stmarylibrary.org and any branch can be contacted which will provide all the necessary information for those wishing to get a library card.