Becoming Digital: Policy Implications for Library Youth Services

AESTRACT THEAUTHOR FRAMES THE POLICY ISSUES surrounding children and digital libraries by establishing two criteria for decision making: (1) Does this policy facilitate access to information by children and young adults? and (2) Does this policy enable the library to provide better service to children and young adults? The intellectual freedom issues are discussed along with the range of responses to them, including the use of filtering software and the teaching of information literacy skills. Both the digital challenge to conventional collection development policy and the problem of equity are linked to the issue of access to information. The outcomes for children from digital libraries are weighed, and a policy metanarrative is constructed from the conflicting images of the child in the digital world by including the computer as an active protagonist interacting constructively with the child.