Building Resilient Communities

The Building Resilient Communities Project aims to enhance the collaborative efforts between public libraries and community-based organizations in addressing the pressing challenges posed by climate change and its associated social and health impacts. Recognizing the urgent need for action, this initiative focuses on empowering library and community leaders to create resilient environments through strategic partnerships.

Funded by the National Science Foundation, the project is led by the Space Science Institute with partner organizations, OCLC's WebJunction program, University of North Carolina Greensboro, and Interactive Learning Dynamics.

The project involves a range of deliverables designed to raise awareness and disseminate critical information, including a symposium, a national survey on library attitudes toward climate resilience, and publications on climate change communication, STEM learning ecosystems, the role of public libraries in climate action planning, and centering health equity and climate justice to support community partnership development.

In addition, WebJunction hosted a webinar series to provide training for library staff, featuring library and community experts from diverse sectors. Ultimately, the project aims to inform a comprehensive research agenda that emphasizes the vital roles libraries and community organizations play in enhancing public health and fostering sustainable practices. Through these efforts, Building Resilient Communities strives to raise awareness of and increase knowledge about how climate change impacts the environment, public health and social equity, and to disseminate information so that public libraries and their community partners can develop and strengthen STEM learning ecosystems that create new, or bolster existing, strategic collaborations and partnerships to address local impacts of climate change. Questions about the project can be directed to the project's Principal Investigator, Anne Holland, [email protected].

Background reports

Read the four background reports examining our state of knowledge in several relevant areas such as climate change communication, STEM learning ecosystems, role of public libraries in climate action planning, and centering health equity and climate justice to support community partnership development. All reports are freely available as PDFs via STAR Library Network.

How a health narrative can enhance communication of six key truths about climate change with diverse audiences by John E. Kotcher

Centering health equity, environmental justice, and climate justice to support communities by Sarah Levin-Lederer and April Wright

STEM learning ecosystems by Rae Ostman

Public libraries are critical agencies in multi-sector climate action plans, policies, and actions by Rebekkah Smith Aldrich

Images: Earth Day 2022, by Princeton Public Library, CC BY-NC 2.0; Earth Day Marin, by Fabrice Florin, CC BY-SA 2.0; Danbury Public Library Tower Garden, by DPL, with permission.

This work is supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant Number 2314180 to the Space Science Institute. Any opinions, findings, and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.