Professional Reading #2

In October 2005, ImaginOn opened its doors in Charlotte, North Carolina. It was a groundbreaking partnership between a library and a theater company. As the library and the theater company began talking they realized they “were both in the business of storytelling” and they could see that there may be room to combine the two areas into an amazing building and location for children, tweens, and teens.

The mission statement of ImaginOn is to “bring stories to life through extraordinary experiences that challenge, inspire, and excite young minds.” There are many different areas within the building that do just that. One area is the children’s area serving children from birth to sixth grade. Next to the children’s area there is a Story Lab which has individual computer workstations called Tale Spinners and groups of computers situated together called Team Machines. Between these two areas a ramp curves up to the next floor for the tween central. This area is called Tech Central filled with forty computers. The five member staff team is there not only to help tweens but also to teach. Nearby are four large classrooms used for rehearsals, workshops, dance studios, and art classes. The ramp continues up to the Teen Loft. Located adjacent to the Teen Loft is Studio-I which is an amazing addition to any library. These areas use blue screen technology to enable teens to create all types of videos. It is unusual for a library to “embrace creation-as opposed to collection-in a medium that isn’t text.”

Unfortunately ImaginOn is suffering budget tensions like so many other libraries nationwide and is currently reducing its hours of operation. The community is rallying to their aid and funds are being raised to help ImaginOn stay open, but it is still discouraging to see hours reduced.

ImaginOn sounds like an amazing collaboration between a library and theater company. I do not have current plans to visit North Carolina, but if I ever go there I am very interested to visit ImaginOn.

Kenney, B. (2005). Imagine this. School Library Journal, 51(12).