Most American Parents Believe that Libraries are Important for Their Children

Think that libraries are obsolete in the 21st Century? A whopping 94 percent of American parents agree that “libraries are important for their children.”


Last year, Pew Research Center’s Internet & American Life Project surveyed 2,252 Americans aged 16 or older to find out more about library attitudes in America. Here is more information from the report:

Original Design
Carnegie Library

84% of these parents who say libraries are important say a major reason they want their children to have access to libraries is that libraries help inculcate their children’s love of reading and books. 81% say a major reason libraries are important is that libraries provide their children with information and resources not available at home. 71% also say a major reason libraries are important is that libraries are a safe place for children.

The report also highlighted how many lower income parents would be “very likely” to use library resources like “classes on how to download library e-books” (44 percent), “e-readers already loaded with library content” (40 percent), or a “digital media lab” (40 percent).

Check it out:

In addition, parents in lower-income households are more likely to say it is important for libraries to offer librarians to help people, free access to computers and the internet, quiet study spaces, research resources, jobs and career materials, free events and activities, and free meeting spaces for the community.

This report is good news, indeed, for devotees of the United States Libraries, an institutions since Benjamin Franklin began the first lending library in 1731.  He convinced his friends in Philadelphia to join forces and donate books to the general public.  (The group had been pooling their books for some time to create a private library for friends.)