Ashoka’s Changemakers and CommunityMatters Announce Strong Communities: Engaging Citizens, Strengthening Place, Inspiring Change Competition

Through the Strong Communities: Engaging Citizens, Strengthening Place, Inspiring Change competition, Ashoka’s Changemakers and CommunityMatters are inviting individuals and organizations to submit innovative projects and ideas to engage citizens in building strong communities across the United States and Canada.

The Strong Communities competition is open to all types of individuals and organizations (charitable and nonprofit organizations, private companies, and public entities). The competition will consider all entries that reflect the theme of the challenge. To be considered for an award, entries must indicate growth beyond the conceptual stage and have demonstrated social impact and sustainability. While the program supports new ideas at every stage and encourages their entry, the judges are better able to evaluate projects that are beyond the conceptual stage and have demonstrated proof of impact.

CommunityMatters is interested in solutions from a variety of disciplines, including but not limited to)conservation, planning, economics, politics, education, deliberative democracy, and the arts, and especially encourages submission of interdisciplinary approaches. CommunityMatters has a special interest in receiving submissions from young people.

Online competition submissions will be accepted until August 11, 2010. At any time before this deadline, competition participants are encouraged to revise their entries based on questions and insights that they receive in the Changemakers online discussion

An expert panel will review entries and select eight finalists by September 22, 2010. The Changemakers community will then vote online to select the award-winners from the field of finalists. Each of the eight finalists will be showcased at the CommunityMatters 2010 conference. One person representing each of the eight finalist entries will win the opportunity to attend the conference (includes conference and workshop registration, lodging, transportation, and meals). The top three finalists will win $5,000 each.

Contact:
Link to Complete RFP

Primary Subject: Community Improvement/Development
Geographic Funding Area: National
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Barbara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy Accepting Applications for 2011 National Grant Program
The Barbara Bush Foundation for Family Literacy is accepting applications for its annual national grant competition. The grantmaking program is designed to help develop or expand projects that support the development of literacy skills for adult primary care givers and their children.

To be eligible for funding, the applicant organization must have nonprofit or public status and must have been in existence for two or more years. The organization must operate an instructional literacy program that has been in existence for at least two years and includes one or more of the following components: literacy for adults, parent education, pre-literacy or literacy instruction for children pre-K to grade three, and/or intergenerational literacy activities (parent and child together time).

A total of approximately $650,000 in grants will be awarded in 2011; grant requests should not exceed $65,000.

The National Grant Program application and guidelines are available at the foundation’s Web site.

Contact:
Link to Complete RFP

Primary Subject: Education
Secondary Subject(s): Children and Youth
Geographic Funding Area: National

In my regular work life, I work with a diverse population of teenagers in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn. As such, I thought that attending a Pre-Conference YALSA Institute discussion entitled “Serving Today’s Diverse Teens” was sure to be something that would serve me well. I was right, though not necessarily for the most obvious reasons.

Serving diverse populations of teenagers, as it turns out, is not merely something that concerns urban librarians. Globalization and conflicts in the last two decade have made the U.S. a refuge for a huge number of immigrants from countries in Africa and Asia, while urban areas have gradually ceased to be the primary destination for new arrivals. Providing adequate, friendly service to new Americans has always been a central goal of the public libraries, but where the mission was once understood as one of ‘acculturation’ in a very colonial sense, we can now look at it as a mission of mutual understanding and learning and, above all, helping immigrant teens preserve their sense of identity while still being active participants in their new homeland.

This was overall message of the three presentations of the day given by Jennifer Velasquez of San Antonio Public Library and an instructor at San Jose State University; Vicki Emery, Media Coordinator at the Lake Braddock Secondary School; and Oesei Akoto Baffour, Administrator of Branch Libraries at the Fort Worth Library.

• Ms. Velasquez emphasized how important the 40 Developmental Assets for adolescents as outlined by the Search Institute. Of primary importance is the sense of belonging that comes from active participation in activities in a place outside the home.
• Vicki Emery demonstrated how ESOL students who are not active readers in the language they speak at home, can develop reading habits through active excercises the help them develop the skills to internalize and recall narrative. Ms. Emery showed some of the book trailers – movie shorts that preview books – created by an ESOL class at Lake Braddock Secondary.
• Finally, Oesei Baffour, who is also a sculptor and a former Teen Librarian at New York Public Library, discussed his own experiences first arriving in America from Ghana and the difficulties in assimilating to his new surroundings.

Equally informative, I should point out, were the conversations that participants from suburban and rural libraries had amongst themselves (over a great lunch provided by YALSA) about how the ethnic and cultural makeup of their communities are changing ever more rapidly. It’s a fact that makes discussions such as these all the more necessary for all librarians to be involved in.

So a great start to my conference! I’ll be sure to check back later with more news from Denver soon.

Orders are being accepted for only the quantities listed below:

• 5,000 each of the three brochures (15,000 brochures total) $2,850 ($.19 each)
• 10,000 each of the three brochures (30,000 brochures total) $4,500 ($.15 each)
• 20,000 each of the three brochures (60,000 brochures total) $7,200 ($.12 each)
• 30,000 each of the three brochures (90,000 brochures total) $9,000 ($.10 each)
• 50,000 each of the three brochures (150,000 brochures total) $13,500 ($.09 each)

Plus a $45 set-up fee for each brochure and shipping cost.

Your library’s logo, address, phone number and web address will be imprinted on the back panel of each brochure. Place your order by November 2, 2007. For more information, or to obtain an order form, visit the www.ala.org/everychild.

Dollar General Youth Literacy Grants
“Provide funding to schools, public libraries and nonprofit organizations to help with the implementation or expansion of literacy programs for students who are below grade level or experiencing difficulty reading.” Application deadlines: October 5, 2007; February 5, 2008. NOTE: Dollar General also lists literacy grants for adults and families, with application periods beginning in January 2008.

Prime Time Family Reading Time
Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities (LEH), ALA Public Programs Office, & National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH)
“Based on illustrated children’s books, PRIME TIME is designed to help low-income, low-literate families bond around the act of reading and talking about books. It models and encourages family reading and discussion of humanities topics, and aids parents and children in selecting books and becoming active public library users.” Application Deadline: November 1, 2007.

Light the Way: Outreach to the Underserved Grant
Association for Library Service to Children (ALSC) & Candlewick Press
“This one-time grant of $5000 will be presented in honor of Newbery Medalist and Geisel Honoree Kate DiCamillo to a library conducting exemplary outreach to underserved populations… Special population children may include those who have learning or physical differences, those who are speaking English as a second language, those who are in a non-traditional school environment, those who are in non-traditional family settings (such as teen parents, foster children, children in the juvenile justice system, and children in gay and lesbian families), and those tho need accommodation service to meet their needs.” Application deadline: December 3, 2007.

I had read an article about this program from the Louisiana Endowment for the Humanities in my Literacy for Special Population course last Fall at Simmons College, so I was curious to hear more and decided to attend this Sunday morning program.

Prime Time is a family literacy program comprised of 6 to 8 week sessions with reading, discussion and storytelling at public libraries and other locations. Each session involves the reading of a few books by a professional storyteller, followed by a discussion led by a “scholar” (usually a university professor). Librarians have the opportunity to market library resources to the program participants during each session. The books are selected for their multicultural representations and the opportunities they offer for discussions of humanities topics.

The program was started in Louisiana in 1991, but has since spread across many other states thanks to grants from the National Endowment for the Humanities and support from ALA. Librarians who plan to implement Prime Time at their library participate in an intense training session in New Orleans several times a year.

During the conference session, we heard stories from a number of librarians who have planned Prime Time at their libraries. Sue Warner from Kalamzoo City Public Library and other librarians from across the U.S. shared their experiences, the ways they made the program work for their community, and their passion for this wonderful program. They all emphasized that this program requires a great deal of planning and is not cheap, but that the rewards are immeasurable.

Prime Time has applied for more funding for 2008 and hopes to support more libraries in the upcoming year both through training and through funding the first series of programming. Check out the ALA site in late August/early September for more information about available grants for Prime Time. For more information about the program see their web site: http://www.leh.org/html/primetime.html

In the afternoon, Joan Frye Williams, Library Futurist, explained why in 2006 the California State Library scrapped its literacy at the library marketing strategies of 20 years to start all over. They surveyed over 200 volunteers tutors and students and concluded that their current publicity efforts were not effective in getting people to “step up to the plate and participate.” The reasoning behind the change and the new approach they’ve initiated is forthcoming.

The second afternoon session featured an expert in volunteer coordination and management, Carla Lehn. Carla is a hugely motivating speaker, who massaged us with true-life stories, words of wisdom gleaned through years of working at nonprofits managing the volunteer resources, and inspirational best practices for finding and keeping your volunteers. Of most interest to me was how to write meaningful volunteer job descriptions organized from the standpoint of the volunteer job seeker, not the employer. For example: subsections include Importance of Position–what are significant outcomes brought about by this position, Qualifications–lists of skills, attitudes, knowledge necessary for the job, Responsibilities—what is expected of the volunteer, Training Provided—volunteers get training, Benefits of Volunteering—positive outcomes from serving, Time Commitments—numbers of hours and months expected, and Grounds for Termination—(yes, you can fire a volunteer). Carla had us writing meaningful descriptions, gave us a pack of job descriptions from libraries all over California, and a copy of her purple book called Volunteer Involvement in California Libraries: Best Practices.

The final day session Valerie Reinke explained the difference between outputs and outcomes and the importance of that difference in “Outcomes: Making the Case for Literacy Services.” Outputs are quantifiable data, the how much and how many statistics that libraries love to collect—circulation, cardholders, holdings, while outcomes are qualitative descriptions of successes in terms lives changed and goals achieved, not through numbers, but through stories that show increased knowledge and changed behaviors. She found that numbers without contexts do nothing to showcase the successes in literacy programs, and when looked at within the context of the library makes literacy programs the first to suffer in hard times because of their comparatively small numbers of people served. This led her to realize that library literacy programs lacked the verbiage to define outcomes according to their own paradigms and left them vulnerable to being defined by others in unfavorable terms. “We have to define ourselves and not let others define us for us.”

At the closing session Taylor Willingham helped us have a conversation about our visions of the future of literacy services in libraries. Starting with Gandhi’s dictum, “Be the change you want to see,” Taylor encouraged us to think about why this literacy symposium was called Mining Gold? She asked us to take a journey into the future and imagine us meeting again in 10 years, 2017. What will we be saying about our literacy programs? We get there from here by right now thinking abut the change you want to see and being that change!! Isn’t this true in all aspect of life?

Kristin Yiotis
SLIS, SJSU
ALASC Chair 2006-07

Dear Library Colleague:

In the spring of 2006, Arthur marked a milestone that few children’s-or adult-series ever attain: ten seasons on the air! To celebrate the occasion, the WGBH Educational Foundation is pleased to launch Arthur’s 10th Anniversary Literacy Initiative, a new outreach effort targeting public libraries.

This new outreach effort is designed to use the series’ continuing popularity to support two intersecting target audiences-libraries and parents. Many parents become library users when their children are toddlers and preschoolers. Many also know the importance of reading aloud to support their children’s literacy development. However, as their children age and become readers themselves, parents often relegate responsibility for their children’s reading success to teachers and become less aware of how libraries can support them and their children as they grow older.

WGBH will award grants in the amount of $1,000 each to 15 public libraries, asking them to design projects using the Arthur resources and targeting parents and children, including soon-to-be as well as independent readers. We seek libraries that represent diversity in size, location, and population served (with an emphasis on reaching at-risk audiences), and will also consider the creativity of their approach and the strength of their community partners (including local PBS stations), which will be essential to access families not currently served by the library.

We invite you to apply for an Arthur’s 10th Anniversary Literacy Initiative grant. Applications are due by Monday, December 18, 2006 and can be found at http://www.ala.org/ala/ourassociation/chapters/literacyoutreach.htm.

If you have questions on the grant application, please feel free to contact Natalie Hebshie, Arthur Outreach Coordinator, at 617/300-3639 or by e-mail at .

Sincerely,
WGBH Educational Outreach

What You Can Expect from WGBH:

• A $1,000 grant to defray the cost of staff time and materials required to develop targeted outreach activities for kids and families.
• Arthur Library Event Guide. This online resource includes ideas to engage kids across the age spectrum in reading activities.
• Let’s Read! (in English and Spanish). This family activity booklet offers ideas for how parents can support their children’s literacy at different ages.
• Arthur anniversary stickers and pencils for distribution to young patrons
• Read Aloud Book Club Kit for young readers, including six book club session cards with activity suggestions, and books for distribution.
• Arthur-themed bulletin board decorations.

What WGBH Expects From Your Library:

• Design outreach activities that support kids and families.
• Partner with your local PBS Station on your outreach activities.
• Utilize ideas and activity suggestions from the Arthur Library Event Guide.
• Distribute Arthur outreach materials, including Let’s Read!, stickers, and pencils.
• Publicize your activities.
• Complete and submit a final report on your outreach activities (final report form provided by WGBH).

Dates to Keep in Mind:

• Grant applications due to WGBH Educational Outreach: December 18, 2006
• 15 grantees selected and notified: January 2, 2007
• Grantees complete final report and submit to WGBH: April 30, 2007

Questions? Please contact Natalie Hebshie, Arthur Outreach Coordinator at 617/300-3639 or by e-mail at .