Teen Mental Health After the Pandemic- What’s Next? OLA 2024 Pre-Conference Session Takeaways

As part of the 2024 Oregon Library Conference OYAN offered a pre-conference session on teen mental health featuring organizations in Oregon that support teens. Our guests included Hayley Shapiro, the Program Director of HOOTS (Helping Out Our Teens in Schools), a mobile crisis intervention organization in Eugene. Craig Leets, the Deputy Director of Youthline a nationwide peer to peer crisis and support line. Parker Preston and Robb Davis from Project Bravery a LGBTQIA+ mental health support organization in Lincoln County & Chris Bouneff, Executive Director of NAMI Oregon (National Alliance on Mental Illness).

The presentation offered numerous resources for assisting teens and how to be there for our teens in the library setting. Please check out the presenter’s websites above for resources. For the purposes of this blog post I am sharing what resonated to me, which is what I can more intentionally do in my day to day work with teens in my community. I invite others (whether you attended the session or not) to join the conversation by leaving a comment. Bonus, I bet you are already doing these things for teens at your library!

Strategies for Supporting Youth and Teens

Teens are under so much pressure! They are experiencing social, school, & home pressures. They are trying to find a purpose. They are also living in the world we live in which includes global events, late-stage capitalism, and climate crisis. While we cannot change this reality, we can listen to them and validate reality for them. Listening to teens is vital, it shows teens that there are safe adults. We can sit with them and listen even when it is hard and uncomfortable. Do not try and make the conversation about your own youth experience, I am guilty of this at times. Our job is not to have all the answers, it is to listen and model healthy behaviors.

Library staff can role model behavior that minimizes harm, have conversations about choices and risks– Why do people take risks? When you engage in risky behavior what might happen? Be genuine with teens, chat like real people. If a teen comes to you with a problem, like a relationship problem for example, be curious about their experience. Ask What makes you feel safe inside a relationship? Who do you have in your life that models a good relationship? Normalize and encourage help seeking behavior, help them seek out help from the organizations above. Teens are the experts of their own experiences. Use your relationships with your teens and when you notice off days, shifts in mood or when someone is not at their baseline check in with them, and take the time to listen to what is going on in their lives.

Destigmatize talking about mental health, normalize talking about mental health struggles. Talk about how you cope and what you do for self-care. Have teens identify a trusted adult in their life that they would call if they needed someone before they have a crisis. Having a trusted adult is a main factor in preventing teen suicide. Have them take out their phone and put that person’s contact info into their phone.

Further training ideas that were mentioned during the session on how to better support teen mental health included Be There Certificate free online mental health training, QPR training, motivational interview training.

Brianna Sowinski, Librarian I, North Plains Public Library – briannas@wccls.org

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Donald E. Long students enter national songwriting competition

Article written by BCLA Program Specialist Jody Redifer, with support from Communications Specialist Paty Rincon

When David Shine, an English teacher with the Multnomah Education Service District (MESD), and Multnomah County Library (MCL) Program Specialist Jody Redifer teamed up, their goal was to bring the youth at Donald E. Long (DEL) Juvenile Detention Center together for a national songwriting competition. The library’s outreach work at DEL is made possible by a longstanding partnership between the library and Multnomah County’s Department of Community Justice.

The songwriting competition, held by BreakFree Education, supports the organization’s mission to “radically improve education in the juvenile justice system.”

For Jody, who has been facilitating a music production class in the library at DEL since late 2020, it was exciting to have English teacher David Shine approach him to collaborate on this competition.

During his time teaching the music production class, Jody has recorded over 200 songs by more than 50 youth. With the combination of David and Jody working together, students at DEL were thrilled to have this project underway. David took lead on the writing, and Jody managed the production and engineering.

Through the songwriting competition youth not only explored music, but also the specific themes pertaining to each song. It is this lesson plan component that allows the youth to grow introspectively, while gaining new musical skills.

BreakFree Education’s mission for this program is that “through this initiative, students explore policy issues that impact their lives. Students harness the power of music to create, produce, and share songs that address issues related to juvenile justice reform.” The songwriting competition is the result of this work, and through it the organization “amplifies the voices of youth justice.”

Students at DEL put their all into the songwriting and performances. This is something which may sound practical, but is not always easy in a detention environment. They expressed their perspective on social conditions and the struggles they and other youth face.

As a result of the hard and thoughtful work the youth put in and the collaboration between MESD and MCL, two of the units at DEL finished in the top 10 nationwide, with unit A2 taking 3rd place on October 28, 2021!

Students at DEL, David and Jody are excited for the prospect of more partnerships like this. In the immediate future, the next collaboration looks to be the publication of works of fiction and non fiction by the students at DEL with the help of MCL. With David working on the writing aspect, and Jody on the publication side, this is bound to be a successful venture! Again bridging the creative ideas of youth, into hands-on and constructive skills.

COVID-19 Writing project

Ian Duncanson (he/him)
Community Engagement Librarian, Beaverton City Library
OYAN Secretary

Photo by Yan Krukov from Pexels

In mid-October 2020, the Beaverton City Library was approached by Riley Kessler, a then 15-year-old Girl Scout who was looking to earn her Gold Award, which is the highest level awarded in Girl Scouts. According to the Girl Scouts, “Gold Award Girl Scouts are rock stars, role models, and real-life heroes. How do they do it? By using everything they’ve learned as a Girl Scout to help fix a problem in their community or make a lasting change in their world.” Riley had participated in some of the library’s previous creative writing contests and proposed that we put together a similar writing project that would allow teenagers to talk about their experiences during the COVID-19 pandemic in a form of writing that they chose. I was unable to have in-person programs, so I was eager to have the opportunity to help Riley with her project. It aligned perfectly with core YALSA and library values and gave teens in our community a voice during the pandemic.

The structure of the project took place over several months. From the outset, I wanted this to be Riley’s project with me in an advisory role. We at first envisioned this as a contest with prizes, like the library’s creative writing contests, but we soon decided to just make it a writing project that would collect experiences for the historical record. As Riley writes, “My goal throughout working on the project was, simply, to bring a voice to a frequently ignored demographic, and in the process help adults gain an understanding of the hardships of being a teenager during such a strange and stressful period of history.” One of the requirements of the Gold Award is that the project must “be sustainable and measurable,” so the entries that we received would be compiled into a book that would be cataloged and added to the Beaverton City Library’s collection and published on the Web. We gave writers the option to remain anonymous due to the personal nature of the writing.

I put together a PDF flyer explaining the project and sent it to Riley for her edits and approval. We collected submissions from April to June of 2021 via an online form created by Beaverton’s Web team. Riley did much of the work getting the word out to schools and the news media about her project. She was featured on KGW news, KPTV, and KATU as well as the Oregon Historical Society’s newsletter. Once the deadline passed, she edited the submissions and put them together into a booklet that we printed through Beaverton’s repro services department. Riley also set up a Web site to share the writing with the public. All told, the project took approximately 13 months from conception to completion, with Riley putting in 80+ hours of work on it.

I’m honored to have been able to help Riley earn her Gold Award by assisting in an advisory capacity for her project. It was great to be able to help with something meaningful during a dark time when so many other things that I enjoy about being a librarian were not possible.

2022 Mock Printz

Do you like young adult books? Do you like to talk? Want to talk about young adult books? Let’s do it!

The 2022 Mock Printz, hosted by the Oregon Young Adult Network, is free and open to teens and adults who work with teens.

1-5 p.m Saturday, January 22 | On Zoom

What do we do? We find and read 8 outstanding books from 2021 and then spend an afternoon in an intensive discussion of those books. Then we vote which is most likely to be a contender for the 2022 Michael L. Printz Award for Excellence in Young Adult Literature.

It’s marvelous. If you like that kind of thing.

Here is how:

1) Sign up at https://bit.ly/OR-MockPrintz2022

2) Find and read the 8 Oregon Mock Printz books:

The City Beautiful by Aden Polydoros – A haunting, Jewish, queer historical fantasy where dreams meet nightmares in 1893 Chicago
All Our Hidden Gifts by Caroline O’Donoghue – A Irish schoolgirl delving into a talent for tarot reading is pulled through the edges of reality
The Burning: Black Wall Street and the Tulsa Race Massacre of 1921 adapted by Hilary Beard from the book by Tim Madigan – Absorbs the reader in the moment and impact of one of the worst acts of racial violence in America’s history
When We Make It by Elisabet Velasquez – A searing novel in verse lays bare the joys and pain of a first-generation Puerto Rican growing up in Bushwick
Incredible Doom by Matthew Bogart and Jesse Holden – Return to the 90s in a graphic novel connecting three teens on the fringe through newfangled Internet technology
Firekeeper’s Daughter by Angeline Boulley – Daunis Fontaine goes undercover for the FBI, seeking answers about a murder and her place in her Ojibwe community
Last Night at the Telegraph Club by Malinda Lo – A tender, risky first love blooms between Lily and Kath in San Francisco’s 1954 Chinatown
In the Wild Light by Jeff Zentner – Deep roots in Appalachia pull at Cash even as he escapes to a new prep-school life in Connecticut and comes into his own as a poet

3) Join us from 1-5 p.m. Saturday, January 22 on Zoom. Information will be emailed to all registered participants as The Big Day approaches.

Questions? Ask Mock Printz coordinator Sonja Somerville – ssomerville at cityofsalem.net

Teen Interactions (Part 1)

Photo by **Mikhail Nilov** from **Pexels**.

KRISTEN BRODBECK-KENNY AT DRIFTWOOD PUBLIC LIBRARY

My favorite interaction was with a young teen who came into the library looking specifically for both fiction and non-fiction about space travel. It was a delightful conversation because he was so clear on what he wanted, particularly in his fiction: near-future, realistic space travel. NOT Star Wars or stuff that waved away the technology. I got him started with some suggestions, and grabbed a copy of Packing for Mars from the non-fiction section. When I returned to the science fiction section and asked if he’d found anything, I was met with, “Probably TOO MUCH!”

Part of the reason it was so delightful is that we all remember him as a pretty obnoxious tween, but on this visit he was absolutely delightful. It’s pretty amazing to see what a year+ can do when it comes to kids and teens!

AIMEE MEUCHEL AT TUALATIN PUBLIC LIBRARY

The most joyful teen encounter I’ve had (so far) has been a group of Upward Bound teens using the Teen Room daily. When I walk in they say “Hi Aimee”. It’s so heartwarming!

MARIAN ROSE AT SEASIDE PUBLIC LIBRARY

The teen book club at my library started meeting in-person and we are having a great time. Discussions are long , relevant to the book, varied opinions and reading experiences, fun and an all-around good time. At our last meeting we discussed books to choose for our next round of reading (we choose four hoping to give each member a chance to get a book in that they want to read). One of the books in discussion and highly desired to read by the group is about a school shooting, This is Where It Ends by Marieke Nijkamp. Then one teen started to tell us about an experience her family had when they lived in a town where a shooting took place in the community. She was obviously showing yet unresolved fear, sadness, and trauma from the experience.

We all acknowledged the realness of her experience and expressed our sadness that she and her family went through. I suggested that we did not have to read this book as it could cause continued pain. She quickly said no. She wants to read the book and spoke of how relevant it is for us to know and understand these situations. These are not her exact words, but my summation. I would not say this is my favorite interaction with my teens this summer, but it was very meaningful to all of us in the group. Teens always surprise me with their bravery to take on these topics and have deep meaningful opinions about them. We will finalize the books to read at our next meeting and I won’t be surprised if this on the top of this list.

2021 Mock Printz

Do you like talking about books? Do you work with teens who like talking about books? We hope VERY MUCH you will join us for the Oregon Young Adult Network’s COMPLETELY VIRTUAL Oregon Mock Printz!

Using various features of the Zoom platform, we are planning an afternoon that is distant, safe, accessible, and so much fun!

YOU are invited! And teen readers are invited!

Mock Printz 2021

A Wild and Intense Afternoon of Book Discussions Ending with an Attempt to Guess which 2020 Release will Win ALA’s Printz Award for Excellence in Young Adult Literature!

1-5 p.m. Saturday, January 16, 2021 | On Zoom

What do you have to do to get ready? Well – read. We ask participants to find and read all (or at least most) of the books on our carefully chosen Oregon’s Mock Printz list. Our committee has finalized the list and here it is:

We Are Not From Here by Jenny Torres Sanchez #emigration #immigration #violence #survival #danger #hope
The Magic Fish by Trung Le Nguyen #graphic novel #Vietnamese #family #LGBTQ #fairytales #beautiful #communication
Not So Pure and Simple by Lamar Giles #sexuality #misogyny #malePOV #unrequitedlove #ownvoices #religion #peerpressure #humor
Elatsoe by Darcie Little Badger #native #Texas #ghosts #vampires #elves #murdermystery #excitement #family #powercorrupts #ancestors #ownvoices
Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You by Jason Reynolds and Ibram X Kendi #history #UnitedStates #perspective #freshvoice #engaging #informative
Black Flamingo by Dean Atta #poetry #magic #queer #personofcolor #comingofage #originstory #British #gorgeous #insightful
The Rise and Fall of Charles Lindbergh by Candace Fleming #superstars #cultofpersonality #influencers #tragedy #flawedhumans #legacy
Clap When You Land by Elizabeth Acevedo #novelinverse #latinx #Dominican #secrets #tragedy #family #beautiful #resiliency

Topic: Teen readers. We enthusiastically value the participation of teen readers in the Mock Printz. Teen participants have to be willing to read the books (or read most of the books) and then spend an afternoon talking intensively with other teens and adults about books. That’s a “not for me” proposition for a lot of teens, but for just the right people, it is MAGICAL. So, ask around. Maybe you’ll find a couple of students who are up for giving it a try! Ready to sign up? We’re ready for you. Fill in this Google Form to tell us you want to be a part of the 2021 Mock Printz – and ask any teen participants to sign up as well.

We hope to see and hear you on January 16.

-Written by Sonja Somerville, Salem Public Library

2020 Fall Programs and Services (Part 1)

Carrie Kasperick at Monmouth Public Library

The Monmouth Public Library is partnering with Polk County 4-H to deliver a Baking Basics class for 6th-12th graders this fall. This fun, free class will be delivered via Zoom, and last for four weeks, and each participant will receive a baking kit with dry goods, spoons, measuring cups, etc. that the library and 4-H are providing.

Stephanie Rubel at Stayton Public Library

At Stayton Public Library we are doing a monthly take and make kit for teens. For September we did a project where they get to design their own stamp and make a stamped pencil pouch inspired Almost Makes Perfect DIY stamped pencil pouches. For October we’re doing Nutley Public Library’s glowing potion bottles.

This month, we are starting a monthly Teen Mystery Box. Each month is a themed box. Each box will have a library copy of a book checked out to them, some treats, and an activity. I’m also planning on doing some video book talks for our YouTube.

Susan Davis at Josephine Community Library District

To support the online and distant educational needs of their teen population, Josephine Community Library District maintains a dedicated tween and teen online learning webpage of relevant resources that include links to local school district online, distant education information, and the Oregon School Library Information System plus highlights services such as their instant online library card and shelf shopper, a personalized readers advisory service.