HHS tries its best to help freshmen at the beginning of the year become well orientated with the school. The library is no exception. At the start of each semester, ninth grade English teachers receive an email from librarian Deborah Witman asking when they would like to bring their freshmen classes down to the library for an orientation.
“[We do it] because they’re new and they need to be oriented,” Library secretary Bradley Walton said. “They’ve never been to this library before and they need to be oriented. They don’t know their way around, they don’t know the policies and procedures…we strip away their newness and give them experienced methods of finding things in the library so they an function confidently and competently.”
The teacher schedules an appointment. On the given day and time, they bring their class down to the library where they meet the librarians Billy Martin, Witman and Walton.
“They bring them in, we get them a map. There’s a map of the library and they have to find where everything is in the library. Then it varies according to teacher,’ Witman said.
Most of the time, the classes proceed to the lab, where they are lectured on library conduct and policies. Things like how long a magazine can be checked out for, where the biographies are located and acceptable uses of the library computers are addressed. They visit the library website, which has an activity that reinforces what they have just learned.
“Then they come out in the library and find a fiction and non-fiction book so we know they know how to find things,” Witman said. Some teachers make their students checkout a book.
Sometimes, orientation can be a bit chaotic. if there are multiple classes in the library or the orientation is during a lunch period, long lines and log jams can form.
“There are days when we end up with a lot of bodies in the library, Walton said. “I wouldn’t say it’s any particular hardship, it’s just busy and there’s long lines at the circulation desk. It’s certainly one of our busiest times of the year.”
Orientation happens twice a year at the beginning of every semester. It is a long standing tradition that the library staff hopes proves useful to the students.
“Incoming freshmen have a lot of info being thrown at them. How much of it actually sticks, I don’t know. I’m sure there’s a certain mentality that ‘I’m never going to actually use this.’ They’re wrong. They do need to come back and use the library. It’s a necessary and important activity,”Walton said.
