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AADL Named Five Star Library for 13th Year in a Row

by richretyi

AADL Five Star Library 13 Years in a Row

For the 13th year in a row, the Ann Arbor District Library earned five stars in Library Journal’s annual ratings of public libraries across the nation. AADL has been a five star library since Library Journal created its America Star Libraries ratings in 2008.

LJ's ratings are based on per capita output measures based on FY18 data from the Institute of Museum and Library Services Public Library Survey. Seven measures determined total scores and star ratings in 2020:

Circulation of physical materials
Circulation of electronic materials
Library visits
Library program attendance
Public internet users
WiFi sessions
E-retrievals (usage of online content like databases)

In Michigan, four-star Kent District Library joins AADL on LJ's list of America Star Libraries. See the full list of libraries earning stars here.

Comments

Congratulations! Richly deserved. I'm sure statistics are going to look very strange this year.

Darn tootin' AADL is five star and more! Congratulations! Thank you for finding a way to make the catalog available safely (if a bit surreal). Keep staying safe and imaginative, Josie and the AADL staff. Thank you! Rainey

Very well deserved. Wonderfully helpful librarians & top notch selection of books & other materials. ! Congratulations! Joyce

Buying electronics and internet data transmission are the most important part of the rankings.
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A) Only 1 of the 6 criteria relate to library use:
physical circulation.
But no measure of quality and range of books available, or encouragment of public use of the library's books.
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B) 4 of the 6 criteria relate to internet use:
1) Successful retrieval of electronic information. (what are the failures?) .
2) Electronic material circulation. (what does that mean?)
3) Public internet computer use.
4) Wi-Fi sessions.
/
C) 1 of the 6 criteria relates to attendance at programs,
but nothing about quality and variety of programs.

Hi there, thanks for asking. The Library Journal star index uses the Institute for Museum and Library Service's Public Library Survey as its data source:

https://www.imls.gov/research-evaluation/data-collection/public-librari…

That survey attempts to collect quantitative usage statistics for every public library in the US, through a process administered by each state's State Library. You're absolutely right that these are quantitative measures. There would not be a realistic method to collect this data in a standardized way using qualitative metrics.

Fortunately, the City recently participated in a qualitative study of resident opinions about local services, which makes a nice supplement to these usage statistics:

https://www.mlive.com/news/ann-arbor/2020/12/from-libraries-to-cost-of-…

And to answer your questions, The successful information retrieval statistic counts articles read or files accessed through databases or subscriptions. This isn't successes as opposed to failures, it's simply a count of the number of electronic files accessed by patrons. Electronic material circulation means checkouts of ebooks or eaudiobooks, digital objects that are loaned out temporarily and must be "returned" before someone else can use them.

If you have suggestions for how AADL can improve its collections, services, or programs, we'd love to hear them. You can contact us at http://aadl.org/contactus anytime with your ideas! Let us know if you have any other questions about this, and thanks for using your library.

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