Transforming physical spaces and library programs into active learning hubs is a powerful opportunity to strengthen the library’s connection to the community. Through WebJunction’s Small Libraries Create Smart Spaces project, a range of free resources and tools—built from the project’s four years of real-life successes—are now available for libraries of all sizes to transform their spaces. In this webinar, we’ll share examples of design thinking and collaboration with the community, and the positive outcomes achieved, even through the disruption of the COVID-19 pandemic. Gail Bruce, director of Laurel Public Library (DE), will describe the arc of discovering community needs and realizing multiple projects to meet those needs at her library. You’ll also be introduced to the Toolkit to Create Smart Spaces, that you can tap into to create your own community collaborations for active learning.

Presented by: Gail Bruce, Director, Laurel Public Library (DE) and Betha Gutsche, WebJunction Programs Manager, OCLC

This webinar is hosted in collaboration with the Association for Rural and Small Libraries (ARSL).

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• View Webinar Recording (You will be prompted to login to our free Course Catalog.)

Webinar Attachments

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• View chat (xls)
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Related Resources and Links

• Small Libraries Create Smart Spaces project
  • Smart Space Transformation Stories
  • Toolkit for Creating Smart Spaces
  • Basket of Discovery Tools (pdf) 
  • Making Space for Active Learning Course
  • Getting to the Heart of Community through Discovery, webinar
• Design Thinking for Libraries Toolkit
  
• Thinking Outside: Libraries and Placemaking in Pandemic Times
• Social Library series on WebJunction, with many examples of library innovation during the pandemic
• D.school Bootleg (pdf) deck with tools and methods for design thinking
• Knight Foundation, COVID-19 has shown we all need public space more than ever
• Palaces for the people : how social infrastructure can help fight inequality, polarization, and the decline of civic life, by Eric Klinenberg
  
• Article series highlighting community discovery process
  • Small Libraries Discover Their Communities
  • Turning Community Input into Workable Ideas
  • Taking the Plunge into Prototyping
  • Smart Space Transformations Transcend Library Closures
• Shared in chat
  • We recently put in a couple of solar powered tables where people can access the WiFi while charging their electonics.
  • We started with some of the ideas from ALA's Libraries Transform campaign and asked people to "vote" for the things that resonated with them.