Rogers Memorial Library

The Rogers Memorial Library continues to function as a community center even during the COVID pandemic. While we have been unable to facilitate the Parent/Child Workshop due to concerns, we began offering limited in-person programming in March of 2021 which was very well received and by the end of 2021 have returned to near 95% in-person. Likewise, we began putting out limited toys on a rotating basis which was also well received. Make and Take crafts have been hugely popular from the time we re-opened our doors in July of 2021 and our social media platforms are heavily utilized to offer programs, advertise, educate and provide information links and on-line support. We also offered both our Winter and Summer Reading Programs online and will return to in-person "reporting" this summer for your older children. Due to our eastern Long Island location, we saw an influx of summer or second home residents as far back as January of 2020. In these 2 years, most everyone has remained which has changed our approach. We have seen many new families. Effects of the pandemic have also been visible in our collections. Much of our A/V has been stagnant as families turned to streaming services during the shut-down. Thankfully however, we have seen our physical children's book collections return to almost pre-pandemic numbers. Sadly that is not the case library-wide. This indicates to me that parents understand the value of the physical book when children are learning to read and experiencing print. An abundance of screen time during the pandemic has also driven parents back to the tangible. Our homeschooling resources have also seen an uptick in interest. Our families, and our overall patronage, clearly value the library as a place for both educational and social development within our community and I have been working very hard to restore to them the tools they need to help, encourage and educate their children.