Actually, She Did That: The Civic Lab for Women's History Month

The team of folks here at my library who curate the Civic Lab were having a meeting a few weeks ago where we were discussing potential topics for future Civic Lab pop-ups. Sometimes we tie our pop-ups to formal programs on our calendar, sometimes to topics in the news, sometimes to installations in the library, and sometimes to specific days or months of import or conversation. We were brainstorming what topic to focus on for Women's History Month, and we had plenty to choose from--there's a lot going on right now affecting women, have you noticed? You might be surprised, then, to hear that the person who came up in conversation was Kanye.

Or maybe you're not too surprised, because he came up in the context of one particularly annoying and eye-roll-inducing line from Famous: "I made that bitch famous," said in reference to Taylor Swift. As if he, a man, made her, a huge pop star who is a woman, famous because he physically took the stage and microphone away from her while she was winning an award. Gross.

And so we had our topic for the Civic Lab for Women's History Month: women who have accomplished something, but who do not get their deserved credit (often it goes to a man or group of men), or they are better known for something irrelevant to their accomplishments.

We called it "Actually, She Did That"--taking the mansplainer's favorite opening word of "actually" and shedding light on some excellent women throughout history whom many do not know and whose accomplishments have been snatched from them.

The central activity in "Actually, She Did That" was a game of sorts. On a column constructed out of our multipurpose crates, we affixed large images of 11 different women who fit our criteria stated above. (As one of the mother/daughter participant pairs said, these 11 are only the tip of the iceberg when it comes to women not getting the credit due to them.) Each image included the woman's name and date of birth (as well as death, where relevant). On the table next to the column, we had 11 slips of paper. Each slip noted the accomplishment of one of these women, with a parenthetical about how or why she hasn't gotten credit for that accomplishment. The goal was to try to match the woman to her accomplishment, learning more about these 11 fantastic women along the way.

Our 11 featured women were:

• Nellie Bly (1864-1922) - Bly was a brilliant, pioneering journalist, despite popular opinion that she couldn't be a good journalist because she was a woman. Bly was an early undercover investigative journalist, checking herself into a mental asylum and writing articles exposing the despicable treatment of (mostly female) patients in these facilities.
• Selma Burke (1900-1995) - A sculptor, Burke was the artist behind the FDR profile that was used on the dime. Yet the (male) engraver typically gets credit for the design, rather than Burke.
• Laverne Cox (1984- ) - Cox is the first transgender actress to be nominated for an Emmy in an acting category. Yet despite her talent and prowess as an actress, much media coverage of Cox returns to questions about her gender assigned at birth--regardless of its lack of relevance to her career.
• Rosalind Franklin (1920-1958) - Franklin's research led to her discovery of the double helix structure of DNA. Her male lab partner stole her findings and gave them to Crick and Watson, who went on to win the Nobel Prize for DNA discoveries.
• Katherine Johnson (1918- ) - One of NASA's "human computers" whose supreme math skills allowed early astronauts to safely start to explore space, Johnson and her colleagues have only recently started to get recognition due to the book and film Hidden Figures.
• Regina Jonas (1902-1944) - The first female rabbi, Jonas was refused ordination for years despite having gone through the same training as her male colleagues. She was finally ordained before being sent to a concentration camp. She died in Auschwitz.
• Hedy Lamarr (1914-2000) - Lamarr was a brilliant inventor, developing spread spectrum communication and frequency hopping technology which are now the basis for cell phones and wi-fi. Yet she is often known only for being a beautiful actress.
• Ada Lovelace (1815-1852) - She wrote the first computer program, although her male friend Charles Babbage is usually credited as the first computer programmer. Lovelace is usually first credited as daughter of Lord Byron. So not only does she not get credit for what she did, but she's defined in relation to her male relative.
• Wilma Mankiller (1945-2010) - Mankiller was the first female chief of the Cherokee Nation. Many American history texts ignore her leadership and maintain there has never been a female head of state in the U.S.
• Arati Prabhakar (1959- ) - Prabhakar was the head of DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, from 2012 until January of this year. Research and developments under her watch have included huge strides in biomedical technology like prosthetics. Credit is typically given to the presidential administration at the time of the invention.
• Chien-Shiung Wu (1912-1997) - Called the "First Lady of Physics," Wu worked on the Manhattan Project. Her work in nuclear physics won a Nobel Prize for her male colleagues, but she was not recognized. Even though the winning experiment was called the "Wu Experiment."

We had some really wonderful conversations with patrons as they engaged in this activity. Many recognized a few names or pictures, but couldn't place their finger on where they'd seen or heard of these women before. We share biographical facts with participants, many of them shaking their heads in frustration at just how common this type of credit-stealing is. One teen girl, participating with a friend, remarked after hearing the stories of several of the women, "Why do they keep giving away credit?" We talked about how it wasn't a question of these accomplished women giving away credit, but rather them having credit taken from them or given to someone else. These teens got mad. They demand better, for the world to see them and their friends and other women. As it should be.

Alongside this activity of matching women to their accomplishments, we also had a few other elements available for Civic Lab participants. We had a number of great titles on offer for folks interested in learning about more women and their accomplishments, including:

• 50 Unbelievable Women and Their Fascinating (And True!) Stories by Saundra Mitchell, illustrated by Cara Petrus
• Bad Girls Throughout History: 100 Remarkable Women Who Changed the World by Ann Shen
• The Book of Heroines: Tales of History's Gutsiest Gals by Stephanie Warren Drimmer
• Dead Feminists: Historic Heroines in Living Color by Chandler O'Leary & Jessica Spring
• Rad American Women A-Z by Kate Schatz, illustrated by Miriam Klein Stahl
• Wonder Women: 25 Innovators, Inventors, and Trailblazers Who Changed History by Sam Maggs, illustrated by Sophia Foster-Dimino

We also put together a handout with resources for hearing more women's stories through an email newsletter, podcasts, and online videos. (See the handout here.)

The handout also includes three questions to get folks considering the stories of women in their own lives, as well as how they can make space to hear and share the stories of women:

1. What have women in your life accomplished? Have they gotten credit for these accomplishments?
2. What would you say to them in acknowledgement of what they have accomplished?
3. How can you help to share the stories of women and their work?

We intentionally posed that first question on one of our crates, and we provided sticky notes and pencils for participants to weigh in. During the two hours a coworker and I facilitated "Actually, She Did That," however, no one wrote a response to the question. We don't think it was from lack of interest, but rather from the greater appeal of learning about the women whose images were front and center in the installation. We're hopeful that the public question, as well as the handout, provided fodder for reflecting on the women in participants' lives.

Monday was appearance number one for "Actually, She Did That." We'll be popping up again this Friday, and we're eager to see what types of interactions are prompted this time around. From there, we want to think about how to continue this idea of making clear space for women and women's stories beyond just Women's History Month.

In the Civic Lab: Let's Talk About Standing Rock

When we started the Civic Lab at the end of this past summer, we knew one of our major goals would be to engage our community in conversations around current events and issues in a landscape with disappearing local news sources. Like many libraries and other institutions dedicated to access to information, we've felt this particular goal explode in import over the past few weeks. Or, rather, it was always important; the past few weeks simply cast the need in a more urgent light. To that end, many of our staff are scouring news and current events to think about topics about which our community can discuss and learn.

This past week, we focused on Standing Rock.

This pop-up of the Civic Lab had a simple statement to bring people to the space: Let's talk about Standing Rock. I worked with a coworker (who is a bookmobile librarian and a philosophy professor) who had gone out to Standing Rock in early November; with lots of input from his experience, research, and resources, we determined that our pop-up would explore three core questions:

1. How do the collective economic gains of the Dakota Access Pipeline weigh against its environmental impact, both actual and potential?
2. To what extent should the protests against the Dakota Access Pipeline at Standing Rock be considered in the context of the history of interactions between Native Americans* and the United States government?
3. How should the government respond to the presence of water protectors?

It should be clear from these core questions that our goal was to provide all of the information, resources, and perspectives our patrons would need to be able to make an informed opinion of their own.

To that end, we gathered and curated a number of resources. These included:

• key definitions (including Standing Rock, sovereignty, Dakota Access Pipeline, protest, and water protector)
• map of the full pipeline from Energy Transfer (the company building the pipeline)
• map of the pipeline, including its original proposed route, overlaid with the Native American territory and treaty boundaries since 1851 (from NYC Stands with Standing Rock**)
• timeline for historical context of Standing Rock (on a laptop)
• Mni Wiconi: The Stand at Standing Rock (8.5-minute documentary; on a laptop)
• "The Conflicts Along 1,172 Miles of the Dakota Access Pipeline" from the New York Times (which explores other conflicts along the pipeline route, not just those at Standing Rock; on a laptop)
• image from Redhawk that was shared on the Standing Rock Rising Facebook page (as an entry point for talking about peaceful protest and government response)
• special issue of the publication Indian Country Today focused on the movement against the Dakota Access Pipeline
• my coworker's jacket he had worn to Standing Rock, on which a water protector had pinned a sign (this certainly caught many patrons' attention)
• relevant books from the library collections

This Civic Lab installation popped up for community conversation last Wednesday evening for 2 hours. In that time, we had some really outstanding conversations with patrons ranging from junior high-age through seniors, and all across the political spectrum. Those participants also ran the gamut in terms of previous knowledge they brought to the conversation; plenty had known nothing, while a small handful were already up on many of the details. While several patrons did feel the urge to identify themselves politically, none of the conversations were overtly political; rather, everyone seemed really eager (and relieved) to have conversations about issues rather than partisan posturing. Only one of our conversations lasted fewer than 10 minutes--that's the level of engagement we're talking about.

This photo from the library's Instagram account shows the
Civic Lab pop-up space and several of the participants.

Through the course of our conversations, we learned that 35% of the folks who stopped to talk had not heard of Standing Rock before they came to the Civic Lab. About 30% of the participants took copies of resources with them and/or expressed a desire to share what they were learning with others; one gentleman snapped some photos of resources to share on his Facebook page on the spot. And, when all was said and done, about 80% of the people who stopped to talk about Standing Rock indicated that they had learned something in the course of the conversation.

What we're learning in these Civic Lab pop-ups is that our community is really interested in having thoughtful and resource-based conversations about topics--both ones they've seen a bit on the news, and ones that are totally new to them as well. Are you finding this in your communities as well?

We're also learning that many patrons want to know when these pop-ups will be happening; they want to be sure they plan to come participate, and a few even said they'd do some advance research to come better prepared. These pop-ups thus far have been true pop-ups in the sense that they aren't advertised anywhere; staff know when they're happening and on what topics (so that we can plan), but patrons participate only if they happen to be in the library when the Civic Lab appears. We're going to change that model in coming weeks; while we want to retain the flexibility to pop up around topics as they emerge, we'll take steps to advertise pop-ups on our website and events calendar (and, potentially, via social media if the topic warrants). If the people in our community want to have these conversations, we certainly want to give them tools they need to do so.

Right now we're in planning stages for what's next for the Civic Lab. Staff are scouring the news and thinking about models for civic engagement that may resonate with our community. As we reflect and plan, I'd love to hear how you're thinking about civic engagement in your own libraries.

*You'll note that we used the term "Native Americans" rather than "First/Native Nations" in referring to indigenous groups participating in the Standing Rock action. We used this terminology because it was the express preference of the water protectors my colleague stood alongside when he was at Standing Rock.

**The #StandingRockSyllabus from NYC Stands with Standing Rock was incredibly valuable in allowing us to curate the content for the Civic Lab; if you've not yet explored it, I recommend you take the time to do so. We also looked to a variety of news sources--big networks and national papers as well as the international coverage and, particularly importantly, coverage from within indigenous communities. 

Pop-Up Stories & Discussion in the Civic Lab

In this first iteration of our Civic Lab here at my library, most of the modes for participation are passive: voting on the major question, browsing the resources, and reflecting on or responding to the conversation starter questions. This first appearance of the Civic Lab has been largely unstaffed--which is decidedly different from how we plan to proceed when we get to round two.

But there has been a specific active component for youth in conjunction with the Civic Lab's debut: pop-up stories and discussion.

I facilitated each of these pop-ups, one for each of our six topic areas. During the days we were focused on each topic, I grabbed the picture book from that topic's micro-collection and headed into the youth services department. I looked for the areas where kids were playing or hanging out, then introduced myself and invited them to participate in one story with some talking afterward. As is usual in our busy library, only a handful of kids were willing to put down the activity they'd been engaged in to participate--but that's fine, as it ensured our groups were small and cozy, better for thoughtful shared reading.

Then, when we were settled around a table, or in a circle on the floor, I'd open the book and start to read. Depending on the particular title, we might immediately start talking about what we saw in the pictures, or words that we were hearing in the story that weren't familiar. The goal of the pop-up stories was to engage kids in the focus topic in a developmentally appropriate way; and in many instances, the reading was the first encounter with the topic. It felt important to share the story together and to think about it, to ask questions and to encourage kids to ask them, too, and to respond with information, or more questions, when appropriate.

Here are the books we discussed:

• I, Too, Am America by Langston Hughes, illustrated by Bryan Collier (Black Lives Matter)
• Where's the Elephant? by Barroux (Climate Change)
• Two White Rabbits by Jairo Buitrago, illustrated by Rafael Yockteng, translated by Elisa Amado (Immigration)
• Yard Sale by Even Bunting, illustrated by Lauren Castillo (Income Inequality)
• Donovan's Big Day by Lesléa Newman, illustrated by Mike Dutton (LGBTQQI)
• My Body Belongs to Me: A Book About Body Safety by Jill Starishevsky, illustrated by Angela Padron (Reproductive Justice)

My favorite, and probably most successful, of these pop-up stories and discussions was with the title Where's the Elephant? In that gorgeous picture book, kids are asked on the first, lush spread to try to find the elephant, snake, and parrot. It's a familiar type of book-sharing for kids--the seek and find. They get really into it, applying laser focus to each spread to find those animals. It gets easier and easier to spot them on each spread, as with each page turn, more and more of the lush forest in which they've lived is cut down. Eventually, the animals are hiding among houses, not trees, until finally they end up in the zoo. Easy to spot? Absolutely. And that visual storytelling makes it so impactful to finish the book and ask the kids, "So what do you think the story was really about?"

Spread from Barroux's Where's the Elephant?

Spread from Barroux's Where's the Elephant?

Where's the Elephant? spurred great conversations about how humans impact our environment, and how that has effects on other living creatures as well as on ourselves. It was a unique approach to the larger topic of climate change, which ties back to humans' impacts on our world. The simple story gave kids a frame for thinking about the topic.

I think this type of activity could be easily replicated outside of a larger initiative like our Civic Lab. A storytime leader could easily add one of these picture books into storytime and have a quick little chat after the story. If parents are present at the story sharing, the story gives them the opportunity to think about how they might have that conversation with their kids. We've anecdotally found that parents do want to talk to their kids about these major topics in the world, but they don't always know how to go about doing so. Sharing stories that connect to major topics can show parents that there are resources to support those conversations, and that their library is a place to go for those resources and for their own support.

Sharing these types of stories gets us engaged in conversation with each other in ways that build community bonds--whether among a family, a neighborhood, or an entire community. Give it a try.

The Civic Lab: Skokie's Civic Engagement Library

Civic engagement is on our minds at my library. Not just because this is an election year--although that certainly adds a layer to the conversation and mood around civic engagement in our community. Civic engagement has been on our mind for several years, and it's informed public programs and initiatives as well as discussions around our strategic plan. We've seen teens and adults having conversations about issues and things they see in the news, and children and their parents trying to figure out how to process those same issues and news items. After seeing The Uni Project in New York, this idea of civic engagement in the library seemed to coalesce for us around the idea of a mobile, pop-up space. And so after a few months' discussions, followed by a few weeks of planning and resource-making, we debuted our civic engagement space at the end of August.

Welcome to the Civic Lab at Skokie Public Library.

The Civic Lab is a mobile, pop-up library with resources and activities. Its first appearance is situated in the library itself--specifically, in our Boutique space, which features seasonal and themed collections throughout the year. The Civic Lab as a concept is meant to offer information and thought-provoking activities meant to support dialogue and engagement on issues that affect our community. For this two-month residency in the library, the Civic Lab is exploring six main issues of impact and importance to our community: Black Lives Matter; climate change; immigration; income inequality; LGBTQQI; and reproductive justice.

This debut Civic Lab includes elements of collection, activities, and facilitated programming.

Six micro-collections comprise the bulk of the materials available in the Civic Lab. Each of our six focus topics is supported by six core resources: two for adults, two for teens, and two for children and families. These lists have been carefully curated, with library staff in nearly every department having input. We've curated these lists not to be neutral, but rather to provide introductions and perspectives on our six topics. Lists for further reading--which also live on our library website--provide even more choices for exploring a topic. All the core resources, further reading, key definitions, and conversation starters appear on handouts in the space. They're also available here:

• Black Lives Matter handout
• Climate Change handout
• Immigration handout
• Income Inequality handout
• LGBTQQI handout
• Reproductive Justice handout

We're rotating some of the interactive components of the exhibit so that each of our six topics has an opportunity for closer focus and engagement over these two months. On one wall of the Civic Lab, we pose a general question relating to that featured topic; when we opened with the Black Lives Matter focus, we asked: "Has the Black Lives Matter movement challenged you to think about racism in Skokie?" The question sits atop a large board for voting, with bright-colored sticky notes ready to be placed on the sections for "Yes," "No," or somewhere in between. Pencils in the space allow patrons to write any comments on their sticky notes, too; and the longer the Civic Lab is up, the more comments people are sharing.

This type of voting component is taking place on a display unit in our youth services department as well. While the questions may be phrased differently for kids and families to be developmentally appropriate, they get at the same ideas and concepts.

We've also set a kitchen table of sorts in the Civic Lab. With boxes surrounding the table for sitting, and a box atop the table with conversation starters on it, the table is meant to be a place to stop and have a kitchen table conversation about these issues. We've left postcards on the table as well, encouraging patrons to share their thoughts--with a friend or family member, or just with the library in general--by writing them down and placing their postcard in our mailbox. These conversation starters are also the basis for some of our facilitated conversations taking place in the Civic Lab--more on those types of programs later.

Today I wanted to share an overview of this first appearance of our Civic Lab. I'll be back in a few weeks to talk about some of the programming elements that accompanied this first iteration, and in coming moths I'll share details about additional instances when and where the Civic Lab pops up. In the meantime, explore the resource lists we've created; have a conversation with a friend or colleague around a topic of import to your community; and make a point of recognizing instances of civic engagement in your library practice.

Equity for Learning: Notes from the Public Libraries & STEM Conference

I'm back again to share my last big takeaway from the Public Libraries & STEM Conference, which I attended in August. As I've mentioned earlier, the conference was small and thus very concentrated. That meant tons of robust ideas throughout the entire 3 days, with lots to chew on and mull over. I've already shared a few takeaways with regard to training and collaboration; today I want to share what I heard, discussed, and thought about programs/services and equity.

To quickly reiterate, one of the major goals of the conference was to help define a new 21st Century vision of STEM in public libraries. For me, it goes without saying that anything having do to with the 21st Century is going to necessarily have a massive amount of thought around how diversity fits in. Our country is getting more diverse, the wealth gap grows, and as public-serving institutions we need to take that into account in what we do and offer.

My three major takeaways from the conference had to do with training (blog post recap here); collaboration (blog post recap here); and equity, which is the topic of today's post.

Susan Hildreth, from IMLS and a fellow of the Aspen Institute, gave a keynote address that focused on the outcomes report of the Aspen Institute Dialogue on Public Libraries. The report emphasizes that the future of libraries is intertwined with the library acting simultaneously as people, place, and platform. Libraries are the individuals who make it up and live its values; libraries are the physical spaces they are and offer; and libraries are a platform for those we serve and what they care about.

A problem right now, says Hildreth, is that many of the people we purport to serve do not see us in this way. They may see us as outdated, as so many alarmist "The library is dying because who needs books anymore?!" articles will lead people to believe. They may see us as irrelevant to them and their needs because of their preconceptions about what we do and do not do, whom we do and do not serve. That's a problem, in no small part because we do do so much more than the general consciousness understands. So, says Hildreth, "We need to invent a new nostalgia for libraries, because the existing one is really hurting us." It is up to us to iterate and prove what we do now, whom we serve.

To do that as a profession, Hildreth says, we need to do a few key things. We need to align ourselves with community goals. We need to have sustainability in our communities. And we need to cultivate leadership so that we will institutionally continue to challenge what we are and what we can be.

In terms of relating to our communities and aligning with their goals, I found one particular statement from Lee Rainie at the Pew Research Center to be indicative of the momentum we can seize. According to Pew and its 2015 report which will be publicly released imminently, Rainie said that there is a clear trend of the public favoring making community and learning spaces in libraries by moving some materials out of public view. Think about that. The public is okay with us relocating some materials--not totally getting rid of them, but relocating them--in order to create spaces for community engagement and learning. Frank translation: THE PUBLIC IS COOL WITH US BEING NOT JUST ABOUT BOOKS. Take that, alarmist articles. So how do we respond?

In terms of the learning experiences and programming we offer, we need to recognize that learning is inherently social. People do it together, they do it on their own time, they do it for their own interest and motivations. And they do it in any number of ways.

We at the conference were encouraged to think about this through John Seely Brown's model of the whole person. A whole person is comprised of three parts: a person who knows; a person who makes; and a person who plays. Libraries have arguably always been pretty good at serving the person who knows, but what about those makers and players? Are we serving them? How? And, most importantly, are we actually serving every whole person, or are we primarily serving the whole persons who fit our notions of an exemplary library user?

By and large, I think that libraries--whether intentionally or not--serve a "typical" patron. But this typical patron is not representative of the breadth and diversity of our communities. It was published after the conference, but this piece "Why We Need Diverse Libraries" by Rachel Smalter Hall comes right out and says that libraries are often biased toward serving one type of patron, at the expense and disservice of everyone else. This is where equity starts to come into play.

How can we begin to really reach these underserved communities and underrepresented populations in our service area? According to Maddie Zeigler, an educational consultant to moderated a panel at the conference, we can start to do so through programs that satisfy a few key components. We can build trust with our communities through planning programs with them, as opposed to strictly for them; who better to know what they want and need than them? We can offer family events which allow entire families to participate together, a model that is much more culturally inclusive than a drop-off-your-kid-and-come-back-later model. We can articulate the educational value of our programs, which in turn can equip families of all backgrounds to determine what they want their kids involved in based on the benefits to them. We can also make programs culturally relevant and personally meaningful; why on earth would we ever expect a kid to engage in a program that doesn't interest them, and why would we expect all kids to have the same interests? And finally, we can anticipate and troubleshoot the myriad barriers to participation that many families experience when it comes to library programming. Do you find yourself saying that you only reach a certain population of your community in your in-library programs? That means there are barriers to participation to address.

With these general strategies in mind, it is important to recognize that there is an additional component when it comes to reaching elementary and teenage kids. In order to have positive, productive learning experiences at the library (or in any setting), youth need to be able to pursue their own interests. That means that programs and services have to in some way touch on or include those interests. Youth also need to be a part of creating their programs and program outcomes. I think this goes a step beyond the traditional Teen Advisory Board model, in which teens help come up with program topics that the librarian will inject into a standard program format. Instead, this refers to full-on connected learning, in which learning ties to the unique interests, peer interactions, and academic success of each youth. Connected learning works because youth help set the topics, and the format of programs, and the intended outcomes. It allows everyone to engage, and for everyone to experience positive impact.

The end goal of equity in programming means that we transform some of our own institutional expectations for what our programs do. Instead of offering programs that are nice for our communities, we offer programs that are necessary. Instead of talking about program success, we talk about the significance that the program brings to the lives it touches.

While nice and successful are great things to be, necessary and significant speak to the fundamental importance and value of libraries. That's what I want to be doing. What about you?

Training for Learning: Notes from the Public Libraries & STEM Conference

In the latter half of August, I spent several days in Denver, CO, for the inaugural Public Libraries & STEM Conference. It was a new and relatively small conference--grant-funded and led by folks at the Space Science Institute and Lunar & Planetary Institute, with around 160 total participants from public libraries, STEM organizations, institutions of informal learning, and library thinkers and researchers. I was able to attend as representative both of ALSC and of my own library. I'm grateful for that opportunity, because I really learned a TON. Rather, perhaps it's more precise to say that I heard from many smart and inspiring people, which has left me we lots of little nuggets and bigger ideas to chew on. Either way, I want to share some of my biggest takeaways with you.

The conference logo aimed to combine a compass and a road leading to the horizon--a great visual metaphor for finding direction on the pathway of STEM in libraries.

One of the major goals of the conference was to "Help define a new 21st Century vision of STEM in public libraries." To that end, there was a lot of talking about what libraries are currently doing; what STEM institutions are doing; trends in libraries in general; and what libraries are best equipped and poised to do in this realm.

I had three major takeaways (each with minor components, which I'm discussing in each of three posts):

• Don't forget training as a necessary component of adding STEM at the library (which I'm talking about here)
• Collaborate within the larger learning ecosystem for greater collective impact (which I'm talking about on the ALSC blog)
• Equity needs to be part of the equation when thinking about STEM programs and services (which I talk about in another post on this blog)

So let's start with a few givens, several of which John Falk from Oregon State University shared in his opening morning keynote. First, there are over 17,000 libraries in the United States. (An oft-quoted sound bite is that this is a greater number than there are McDonald's restaurants in the U.S., with libraries having around 3000 more locations in this country.)

That's a lot of libraries, as and Lee Rainie from the Pew Research Center shared, we're right up there with firefighters and nurses in terms of community figures with the most public esteem and public favor. So people are favorable toward all those libraries we have in the U.S.

Falk also pointed out that research indicates that the primary reason people engage in STEM learning is to satisfy their personal interest and curiosity. So STEM learning is largely self-motivated, because people have an interest or something they are curious about. Libraries are an excellent place for this, as more and more learning is taking place outside of formal school contexts. Falk quoted that about 3% of a typical American's life is spent in formal schooling--and 97% spent elsewhere. If the library is one of the places that make up "elsewhere," and people are interested in STEM, it would seem to follow that libraries as places for STEM is a serviceable idea.

And this is something that conference organizers and attendees have seen. STAR_Net, a community of practice for libraries doing STEM, did a national survey to see what the state of the field is in this specific area. What they found ties in many ways to preparation, training, and support for the staff who will be implementing STEM in various ways in their libraries. With regard to programming, this survey found that lots of practitioners are looking for off-the-shelf program resources that they can immediately adopt and adapt for their libraries. In terms of training, these same staff are interested in both online and in-person training opportunities to gain content knowledge as well as confidence to offer STEM learning in the library. And finally, it found that staff would like a clearer pathway toward collaborating with community partners when it comes to STEM.

In exploring the survey responses and data from interviews, what becomes more clear is that people say they want more how-to resources. But that statement is just part of the issue, the easiest bit to articulate. The resources are just the front end of the equation; the rest is having interaction with peers and colleagues who can help put those resources into context and practice in practical ways. It's the difference between having a resource manual alone or having a manual and a colleague to go through it with you.

For libraries, STEM practitioners, and folks invested in informal learning in general, this means that we need to refocus some of those energies that we've all been putting into developing our own unique resources. There are plenty of resources available, and the trend of all libraries wanting to create their own from scratch is an instance of reinventing the wheel. A better use of time and energies would actually be to create connections between people and resources that already exist--letting practitioners know what is already available to them rather than asking someone to start from square one.

This comes down to people. What can people do to share what they know, the resources they've created/found/used? David Lankes spoke in his keynote about how libraries themselves are just buildings; as a concept, they are abstractions and thus cannot do anything or have an impact. It is the people in libraries, however, who are real and who can do things and who can create impact. So it's up to people. If practitioners and would-be practitioners of STEM in libraries need to be connected to resources to learn and gain confidence, then it can follow that libraries are the best positioned to help meet this need.

So perhaps my biggest takeaway on this point of training and informal learning is really more of a question: To what extent is it the responsibility of libraries with successful STEM models to train the rest of the profession, especially those without easy access to professional development? If I'm already doing STEM in the library, and as such have garnered experience and created and gathered resources, in what ways it is my responsibility to share my experience and resources with those libraries who haven't had that opportunity, or who are craving more training and context? If we have it, shouldn't we share it? If training as needed, and it is within our capacity to train, shouldn't we train?

I'm inclined to say "yes" to this question in general, although at some point questions of capacity and institutional priorities come into play. But as a general ethos, don't you think our training one another when it's within our power is a good--and in some ways progressive--concept?

Thinking Outside the Book: Soccer Storytime

Not too long ago, we hosted a Ballet Story Time at my library, to great success--lots of families were excited to attend a program with a real, live ballerina in attendance, ready for questions and pictures. So, of course, I wanted to figure out a way to replicate that same enthusiasm for another audience of library families. The result? Soccer Story Time.

The St. Louis Lions are a local soccer team in the Premier Development League, and our library district has worked with them on a number of occasions for special events in the past. They were happy to be able to come to my branch for a specialty program. Here's what we did.

Soccer players love to read, too!

Soccer Story Time

Welcome & Introduction
     I welcomed everyone to our event and reminded everyone about the summer reading program. Plenty of kids were already signed up for summer reading, and a handful had seen the Lions at our summer reading kickoff event earlier this month. Then it was go time.

Story: For the Love of Soccer! by Pelé, illustrated by Frank Morrison
     This story, and its illustrations, share a soccer tale that many kids can relate to. We see Pelé as both a young soccer enthusiast and as a professional player, enjoying everything about the game the entire time. The message that playing for the love of the game--as opposed to a love of winning--is a good way to conclude, too.

Soccer Time!
     We started with a chance for the kids to ask our four attending soccer players questions: about when they started playing, how much they practice, etc. After the questions had been answered, the players demonstrated a few trick moves for the crowd before breaking the children into groups for some basic soccer skills practice. The youngest in the crowd worked on kicking, older kids did dribbling and other moves. Then, we concluded soccer time with a good old-fashioned shoot-out. The professionals were the goalkeepers and the kids tried to kick goals. My, were they having fun.

Craft and Picture Time
     I had a simple soccer ball craft set out on tables at the back of the room to help keep folks interested as they waited their turns for autographs and photo ops. The craft used a hexagon template I created, which allowed kids to color in the hexes, cut them out, and glue them on a coffee filter. Ta-da! 2-D soccer ball.

Everyone had a great time at this program, with many of the attendees psyched to go see a St. Louis Lions game this summer. I think World Cup fever helped the interest level, too, as well as the general ubiquity of kids in soccer around these parts. All things considered, this was a straightforward and enjoyable way to tap another aspect of the community for a library program.

The Second Annual Summer Reading/Picture Book Walk Kickoff Event

Summer reading is in the air here in St. Charles County; despite my local school district still being in school until Friday (thanks, snow days!), we're off and running with our annual summer reading program.

For the second year in a row, my branch helped kicked things off through our partnership with St. Charles Parks & Recreation. This summer marks Year Two of our Picture Book Walk at Quail Ridge Park, a local county park with a number of paved trails, one of which boasts 17 beautiful, handmade signs displaying the entirety of a picture book, spread by spread. For details on the "hows" of the project, check out my post on the topic from last summer.

This year, the book around the lake trail at Quail Ridge Park is the immaculately illustrated Berlioz the Bear, by Jan Brett. The introductory sign encourages wandering readers to pay special attention to what's going on in the illustrations around the edges; Brett is known for fitting intricate visual storytelling in every space of the page. While this book doesn't have as explicit a connection to nature as last year's choice (The Curious Garden by Peter Brown), I chose it for the walk because it invites leisurely reading. The buildup of the story, the visual interest, the climax of the story--they all lend to a relaxing stroll along the trail while enjoying a great book.

The library and parks department team up to put on a festive kickoff event in the lodge adjacent to the Picture Book Walk trail. After some introductory remarks at sign #1, as well as the option of "guided walks" (in which a library staffer or volunteer leads a group and reads from the pages), children and families are invited into the lodge for a range of activities. This year, we offered the following slate:

• light refreshments of a cake (donated by Sam's Club) and cookies, along with plenty of water (all outdoor activities require continued hydration!)
• summer reading signups for children, teens, and adults
• a memory game involving matching overturned pictures of instruments (many corresponding to those played by Berlioz and his friends in the book)
• summer reading tattoos
• shaker instrument craft station (decorate and attach a colorful strip of paper to an empty plastic water bottle, use a funnel to add ½ cup rice, top the contents off with a pretty bead, and duct tape the whole thing shut; voila, recycled shaker!)
• tree cookie necklace craft from the Parks Department (using wood from invasive cedar that has to be removed from the parks)
• Parks Department information
• St. Louis Lions soccer team information and ball drills with real players

These eight activity stations were ongoing throughout the two-hour event, with a special performance halfway through the kickoff by one of the park rangers. He shared and passed around a huge range of animal pelts of creatures indigenous to Missouri. Kids had a great time feeling the different furs and seeing the range of sizes of these animals. Most recognizable by far: the skunk.

I had teen library volunteers to help staff the library's activity stations, as well as some assistance from my colleague Miss Melanie at the summer reading signup station. The library could not have offered so many activities at the kickoff without their help.

In the course of the two-hour kickoff event, we shared reading and recreation with just over 200 people, mostly children and their families. We got tons of folks signed up for summer reading, and we generated a ton of excitement about returning to the park to experience the Picture Book Walk again. The Berlioz the Bear installation will be up for several months, hopefully giving every interested family a chance to experience it.

If you happen to be in the Wentzville, Missouri area this summer, I do hope you'll stop by!

Thinking Outside the Book: Where's Waldo Activity Pages

My, my, my, am I into repurposing falling apart books lately.

My latest endeavor in reusing withdrawal fodder is meant to provide diversion for the kiddos stuck with their parents at the public computers. As I've mentioned before, our public internet computers are not in immediate proximity to the children's area. Which means, if a caregiver wants to use the computers and there's no one to attend to the child/ren in the children's area, the kids have to stay in the computer area.

As I've also mentioned before, we aim to do what we can to keep these young customers engaged and happy while they wait for their grownups. We've got coloring books and crayons, portable toys, quick reading material... And, now, stand-along Where's Waldo sheets.

You see, I had a Where's Waldo book that was falling apart. While the binding was shot, many of the pages were just fine. So I spent a few minutes locating Waldo on the pages that were in good shape, then cut those pages right out of the (now withdrawn) book. I printed up some sheets with the library logo and the request to return the pages to the information desk when the quest for Waldo was complete. Then, when I was visiting the cataloguing department to laminate the pages for our second annual Picture Book Walk, I laminated these standalone Waldo activity sheets, too.

Now the sheets are at the information desk, and I anticipate them getting plenty of use this summer when the days are hot and the computer bays are packed.

And who knows! Maybe I'll stumble upon something else to repurpose soon.

~~*~~

Do you ever repurpose library materials that are falling apart? Tell me how!

Recycled Book Bunting

It's fair to say that I am not crazy about decorating in the library. In fact, I'm pretty much anti-decorating. At the very least it costs time, then oftentimes you add in craft supplies or purchased decorations, and pretty soon you have something else in the library that'll collect dust and/or look dated when you forget to take it down in time. I'd much rather put my time and effort into appealing materials displays than decorating.

But.

You know those uber-popular kids books that are so heavy their bindings break much too quickly? Think Star Wars character guides and Disney storybook collections. They always have a high damage rate, as the many thick pages stress the binding. I've been replacing a lot of these titles recently, but instead of just withdrawing and recycling the pages of the fallen-apart copies, I saved them.

And I made decorations for the library.

Recycled Book Bunting in all its colorful, draped glory!

I know! Me! Decorations!

A close-up of the bunting.

I made a triangle template out of cardstock and cut out recognizable characters from the pages of these books: Mickey Mouse, Nemo, Mulan, Bambi, C-3PO, Yoda, Princess Leia, etc. I also made triangles out of bright blue and green, our library's colors, and strung all the little flags up on some purple string to make bunting. Our maintenance staffer hung them Monday morning, and I must say I'm pleased with the results.

So, despite my being someone who generally abhors decorating, apparently I think it's a grand idea when it repurposes illustrated books that have met an untimely demise. By turning the recognizable illustrations into colorful bunting, we're getting more bang for our buck out of these titles.

And now I'll go back to my general "our decor is fine how it is" M.O.

Thinking Outside the Book: Ballet Storytime

It's probably no surprise to anyone that a ballet-themed story time is a hit with our young program-goers; after all, how many young ones are in ballet and other dance classes, and how many more love the idea of dancing? And so a ballet story time is really a no-brainer. But what if you think outside the book when planning that story time and partner with a ballet professional in your community for an extra special program experience?

That's what my library district has been doing this week. My colleague made a call to a ballerina with the Missouri Ballet Theatre, and before we knew it, a ballet dancer was scheduled to make a costumed appearance at storytimes at each of our programming branches. Since the real live ballerina is a huge draw for this program, that means restructuring the story time format a bit. Here's what we did.

Ballet Storytime

Welcome & Introduction
     I wanted to make extra sure that all our attendees had time to get into the program room, so I spent the first few minutes of the program time talking to the children (many of whom came in tutus and other fancy dress). We talked about who likes to dance, who takes dance classes, what they wear to dance, and who had been to the ballet. Lots of fans of The Nutcracker here.
     When it was time to get started, I introduced myself and Miss Rachel, our ballerina from the Missouri Ballet Theatre who was in full Sugar Plum Fairy regalia. I also explained the format for our special story time.

Story: Brontorina by James Howe, illustrated by Randy Cecil

     This is truly a dance story of grand proportions: it's got dance, dinosaurs, worries about fitting in, and strong friendship themes. I did my read-aloud of this book standing up, which allowed me a larger range in sharing the illustrations--a necessity considering we had about 60 people show up for the program. There are a few pages that show Brontorina and her dance classmates doing a few ballet steps, and Miss Rachel demonstrated those moves so that the children could get an even better idea of what they look like.

Ballerina Time!
     After the story, Miss Rachel took over for a bit. She invited all of the children (almost all girls, with one lone boy who was equally captivated by the demonstration) to stand and try some ballet steps. The learned to stand in first position, to plié, to arabesque, and to relevé. They finished up their mini lesson with a combination--a short dance, if you will. There was plenty of excited ballet dancing going on.
     After I had the children sit back down, they were able to ask Miss Rachel questions. Questions included how long she had been dancing, what are her favorite ballet roles, and questions about what moves she can do and how much she practices. Our lone male storytime attendee raised his hand last to ask if boys can be ballet dancers, and Miss Rachel happily shared how important male dancers are to ballet.

Craft and Picture Time
     Our event advertisement mentioned that there would be a photo op with the ballet dancer, and many a young friend was clamoring for just that chance. To help with crowd control and keep the line of children waiting to meet the dancer short, I also offered a simple ballet craft at the back of the room. I printed (and a volunteer cut) card stock ballerinas. I set these out with crayons and scissors, and also available were cupcake liners, which could be glued on with glue sticks to create tutus and dancing skirts (see finished craft in above photo). The children could do the craft then get in line for a picture, or vice versa, or any combination that worked for them. I made sure to have plenty of ballet fiction and nonfiction books by the photo op area, too, to encourage folks to check out a book and keep learning about ballet. Having two activities going at once definitely cut down on the waiting time for pictures with Miss Rachel, and it also helped us keep the program at the advertised 45 minutes.

All in all, our Ballet Storytime was a delightful success. I saw several attendees leap and dance out of the library afterwards; I think that's pretty indicative of a meaningful library experience, when you are literally acting out the program as you head home.

Winter Walk at the Park

This past summer, a collaboration between my library and the county parks department resulted in some rather fetching natural-wood signs being permanently placed around a local park trail. While the impetus for those signs came down with the end of summer, both the library and parks department expressed an eagerness to continue our partnership through the winter instead of just waiting for next summer.

Click the image to enlarge.

The result is using several of these lovely signposts to share information that may be useful or interesting to our community members. The signs I created on behalf of the library feature what I hope will be some bits of inspiration for folks enjoying a winter walk. Using our library databases, I put together two different signs: one inviting hikers to look for three different birds native to Missouri this time of year; and one exploring the science and poetic beauty of snowflakes.

Click the image to enlarge.

The recent snowstorms prevented me from getting pictures of these signs in place out on the trail, but hopefully these images will suffice. I am thrilled that we're using library information sources to create a sort of mini-exhibit, full of images, information, and tips for using the library for further exploration of these topics.

Do you have any winter outreach to your community?