YOLIE FLORES: I hope you had a wonderful, wonderful lunch. I want to welcome you back
and hope that you all can find your seats quickly. We have a great panel. And so I'm
going to get us started. I'm Yolie Flores I'm a senior panelist for the Campaign for
Grade Level Reading I'm not Ralph Smith I am he sends his regards I'm your moderator
for this afternoon's session only leveraging partners. I'm especially honored to be with
you because it was a partnership between IMLS and the Campaign for Grade Level Reading that
resulted in a report that many of you know called growing young minds a report as a Call
to Action for libraries and museums to play a significant role in early learning for all
children Indeed it was as a result of this report that
IMLS has invested 8.5 million dollars since 2013 on early learning efforts. For this we
are truly grateful and recognize IMLS' commitment to the youngest and most vulnerable children
in our country. The Campaign for Grade Level Reading shares
a very similar commitment. About four years ago the NECKE foundation released a report
that gave birth to the Campaign for Grade Level Reading.
The report was called: Early Warning: Why Reading by the End of Third Grade matters.
At its release the Director of the campaign, Ralph Smith, shared the following words, we
have raised a concern about the alarming number of children who are not proficient readers
by the end of third grade and used the data and the research to suggest that this statistic,
which is now stagnated some place in the zone between abysmal and catastrophic has significant
and long-term consequences for these children, for their families, for their communities
and for our nation. It is no exaggeration to say that left unchecked,
this particular problem will compromise and undermine our nation's commitment to end intergenerational
poverty You can hear the sense of urgency in Ralph's
words. It is this urgency that has committed us to this work focusing on school readiness,
attendance, and summer learning, three critical contributors to reading and succeeding in
school. And it is this urgency that is galvanized
over 160 communities across 41 states and organizations like IMLS and many others to
put a stake in the ground around the unacceptable reality that too many children can't read.
Well, so just how many children is too many? And what did Ralph mean abysmal and catastrophic?
In 2013, 80% of low income children could not read proficiently. For African-American
children and Latino children, the data is even worse. For African-American boys, it
is devastating. This is why IMLS and the Campaign for Grade
Level Reading are working hand in hand to reach millions of parents and children in
the very early years. And here is why, we all know the science now
and how consequential period is for the developing child from the moment they are born. We know
that early learning experiences matter and that only when we open our doors, feed curiosity,
offer places where children can explore, touch, interact, make the world come alive will we
all build brains and fuel a love for learning as the Growing Young Minds report so clearly
conveys. And this is why partnerships matter. It is in reaching out and connecting with
others that our work can prosper on behalf of kids and families. The research tells us
that parents of young children, especially low income families, are hungry and eager
for places like the library and museums that can nurture their children and put them on
a path to success. Our panelists today will share with us how
they are engaging and leveraging partnerships to reach these families and their children.
We're eager to hear from them so without further ado let me introduce you to Sherri Killins,
Kyle Zimmer and Janet McHeny, Cheryl is Director of systems alignment and integration for the
BUILD Initiative, which works with state and national leaders to develop coordinated high-quality
systems of early childhood care and education committed to diversity, equity and inclusion.
In her role at BUILD, Sherri has helped implement the 2014 IMLS cooperative agreement to better
integrate museums and libraries into statewide early childhood systems.
The project is working with five pilot states. Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania and
Washington. And creating an early childhood systems self assessment tool.
Kyle Since 1992, Kyle has led First Book, a nonprofit social enterprise that Shico founded
to ensure that local schools and community programs serving low income kids and families
have a steady supply of brand-new high quality books. In fulfilling its mission, First Book
has built a rigorous online registration process to authenticate that the individuals, programs
and classrooms are serving children in need. First Book's existing network will help distribute
access credentials for the open eBooks platform among communities of low income youth and
you'll hear a lot more about that from Kyle. And third is Janet. Janet serves as Director
of library development for the Maine State Library, Maine as in the state of Maine which
is part of the existing new IMLS national leadership grant effort to help public libraries
serve as community science centers. It's called Cornerstones of Science. In Maine and in Massachusetts,
this will mean developing the capacity for new partnerships and community outreach that
will allow more kids more access to the science and technology that's right in their backyards.
And before we hear from Sherri, Kyle and Janet, I also want to recognize Brian Gallagher,
the Executive Director of Reach Out and Read who wanted to be with us, also, today. He's
under doctor's orders to stay home and recover from strep throat. But I know that Brian was
planning to tell us all about Reach Out and Read and their new partnership with IMLS called
Prescription for Success this is an effort to deepen connections between pediatricians
and libraries and museums in ways that help strengthen partnerships that promote early
literacy and we wanted to be sure all of you knew about that as a resource. I'm now going
to ask Sherri, Kyle and Janet to say a bit more about their organizations and their work
with IMLS. Especially so that all of us can learn more about those connections and cross
sector partnerships that promote early learning and literacy, especially for low income children
and families. In terms of format, they will each take five
to seven minutes. And then we'll open it up to you for questions. If there's a burning
question, question for clarification, right after each one of them, I can take a couple.
But if not we will wait until the three of them share and then we'll open it up to all
of you. And we'll start with Sherri >> SHERRI KILLINS: Thank you, Yolie and thank
you IMLS for inviting me here today I'm excited to be here with all of you I've actually gotten
a chance to go to the American Library Association conference last year because as BUILD was
putting together this partnership with IMLS, we did lots of listening and talking to both
libraries and museums. The BUILD Initiative works with state leaders around the country
to develop comprehensive programs, policies and services that meet the needs of young
children and their families. We really focus on building integrated systems
between health, early learning, and family support with attention to early intervention
to try to remediate or prevent risk. This systems building approach is happening
all across the country. So when IMLS approached us about being a partner in implementing some
of the recommendations from the Growing Young Minds report, we thought we were the perfect
partner to really create deliberate mutually beneficial connections between museums, libraries,
and early childhood systems. We wanted to build relationships that were embedded and
had the ability to be replicated and sustained. The Growing Young Minds report had a couple
of recommendations. They wanted to increase access to high quality early learning experiences.
They wanted to engage in and support families They wanted to create seamless links between
early learning and the early grades. They wanted to improve family health, nutrition,
by ensuring families have access to information. They wanted to leverage their community and
state partnerships. And they wanted to build and really be active participants in the early
networks across the state and within their community.
So we began by working with state librarians who often brought local libraries or regional
libraries to the table. We worked with museums. And we worked with state early childhood systems
leaders. And while we targeted five states, we really
began this work with a series of webinars that were often attended by 4 and 500 people
from across the country, again, trying to make more visible the work in early learning
from the state level to libraries and museums and make more visible to libraries and museums
the work going on at the state level. In fact, those webinars are taped and you
can find them on the BUILD Initiative Web site if you're interested in hearing more
about them. But we did do deeper work in the five states
that Yolie mentioned to really understand the state context, the partnerships, and to
really learn from libraries what was necessary. Everyone agreed that children are most significantly
shaped by their families and their communities. And that the state early childhood system
really has to be designed in a way to recognize and respond to families and communities and
cultures. And we see libraries and museums as really anchor institutions you sit your
physical building sits in those communities. So of course you had a lot to share. We really
wanted you to help inform the state early childhood system, it's vision but also take
advantage of a lot of the tools and information that have been created at the state level.
And early on it was clear we agreed on some things. We agreed that there's a science behind
child development and you have mentioned a lot today the importance of professional development
but many libraries are doing that across the country with the resources that they have.
We agreed that children need literacy and often libraries have been forgotten about
state library associations when there's campaigns but it wasn't just literacy the book It was
the social-emotional development it was the cognitive development it was the language
and literacy it was also the physical and motor development and the children and families'
approaches to learning that was really going to feed their ability to become strong learners
and readers. And you agreed that there were some children
that were just left out. That you thought about libraries as places that had equal access.
But many of you had already discovered that just being an anchor institution or building
in a community wasn't sufficient. Many of you were already going out and doing activities
in the community. Of course financially stressed to do that and only usually able to do it
around grants. And that there were often children and families who needed more support to be
able to enter your space and your institution. And everybody is funded with these multiple
funding streams So there was a lot of agreement that partnerships were usually created around
a grant. And that was a part of what we wanted to change. We wanted to build those partnerships
so people could go to them before there was a grant and the foundation had already been
laid. A lot of times this was the first conversation between especially libraries and museums and
state early learning systems. Often people had big relationships with an institution
like head start and not necessarily at the state level everybody agreed on every level
whether libraries, museums or early childhood systems there needed to be intentionality
in terms of professional development. In fact libraries often had the skills, knowledge
and ability to provide professional development to early childhood educators in their communities
and in one state, Pennsylvania, that became a part of what they were able to do.
We began by creating a toolkit. Our charge from the Institute of Museum and Library Services
was to identify what was necessary in order to find out what was necessary in terms of
what was necessary so we could build a toolkit that didn't necessarily have TA attached to
it but that a library in a community, a state leader, a museum could pick up and begin to
use we wanted that toolkit to help recognize the importance of what's going on in libraries
and museums And we found in our work that since everybody agreed about family engagement,
that was an area where folks could work together. So we have created that toolkit. It has four
major sections. One is simply articulating the strengths of libraries, museums and early
childhood systems, having that shared conversation. The second section is on creating agreement,
what should we work on together. This project had no new money. And so getting people to
agree that there was something to do together was a lot about high-needs children and using
the data as Yolie pointed out to say who aren't we meeting the needs of.
We have a section on designing and implementing strategies. And then a section about the partnership.
And so our next steps are to publish that toolkit some time this summer We are encouraging
state leaders who we have a lot of access to at BUILD to include libraries on their
planning groups at the regional and local level and we have seen some of that happen
in our state. And we want to continue to build strong partnerships between states and communities
in a larger frame around creating supportive communities
>> Kyle. >> Clarifying questions? Okay. Good Kyle
>> KYLE ZIMMER: I'm Kyle Zimmer I run a program called First Book we are based on Washington
D.C. but we happily have a network that includes about 180,000 classrooms and programs serving
kids 0 to 18 years of age. With a real focus on low income.
I want to make one quick comment at sort of the 60,000 foot level Because I walked into
this room loving librarians and libraries and I can still close my eyes and see the
linoleum in the Zanesville, Ohio -- section it was brown and tan I don't know who made
that decision but we can talk about that later. But -- and I'm always blown away by what's
going on in libraries and childrens museums And I think as I was sitting here today, I
was thinking to myself, you know, this is a tough period that we're all living through.
Major institutions that we sort of thought were bullet proof or hoped were bullet proof,
you know, the court system, law enforcement, are sort of showing their vulnerabilities
and their failures. And you know when I was -- and you look -- and then you find out that
like our currency is being controlled by six guys in a private chat room, you know, so
things that you thought were sort of above all of that are not. And I think there's significant
disillusionment going on. And when I sat here, I thought, you guys are standing in complete
stark contrast to those failures. And you're stepping up to social issues that are -- that
have challenged the country for decades and decades Employment and immigration and disabilities.
Like the list just goes on and on. So I just wanted to do a huge shoutout to
you all because I am ten steps removed from your work. But it is jaw dropping what you're
doing out there. So now that I've said that, I'll tell you
what I'm doing. (Applause).
>> KYLE ZIMMER: I'm the one who should be applauding. So First Book has built two big
jet engines. One is called the First Book National Book Bank The Book Bank is the older
of the two What it does is places excess inventory from the publishing industry and other industries
and puts them first the First Book network and into the hands of kids and people who
are trying to serve kids at the bottom of the economic pyramid.
And that program places about 10 million books annually. It is the individuals and the institutions
don't pay for the books. They only pay a shipping and handling fee that on average is about
45 cents per book. It's a ridiculously efficient system. And
so it's very high volume and it's very low cost.
The bad news about it, and you guys would know this before I even say the sentence,
is that it does not fix the problem. It doesn't get teachers what they need It doesn't get
volunteers what they need. Necessarily. It's a lovely program. But we need to fix
the fundamental issues. So then about ten years ago we invented something called the
First Book marketplace. And we went to the publishers and we said, look, the consignment
design of the book industry, which means that anything that's not bought at retail comes
flying back to the publishers. That fundamentally -- and this is an MBA term
so I'll say it really slowly, it screws it up for --
(Chuckles). >> KYLE ZIMMER: For everything that all of
us are trying to achieve. Because what it means is they have to bake into their price
point at retail the cost of all of that inventory that's going to come flying back. So we end
up with premium picture books that cost $18 a piece. Nobody knows the pain of that like
you guys And so we went in and said to the publishers, let's fix that. Let's fix that
problem. We said what we would like to do is build a system where we aggregate the market
of anyone serving kids in need. All they have to do is register with us for free online.
And then we will buy on a non-returnable basis inventory and not excess inventory but like
the best in show. That's what we try for. And so we built the marketplace and we said
to the publishers what we want you to do now since you're not paying to aggregate the market,
you're not paying to advertise to this new market, and we are buying and the inventory
is never going to come back to you, we want your prices to us to reflect that new market
that we're building. That's what the First Book marketplace is. It now has about 6,000
titles on it. We're pushing that up as fast as we can And the average price of a paper
back book including shipping and handling on the site is $2.85. Yay. It's not where
it needs to be. We want it to go lower all the time but that's where we are today.
Now, I want to talk -- I'm just going to do a fly-by because I have one minute left.
(Chuckles). >> KYLE ZIMMER: Of a couple of different categories
of partnerships. One is of course with IMLS with a remarkable open eBooks campaign that
was announced at the White House earlier just three or four weeks ago. And that's an extraordinary
effort First Book is stepping up to be the authenticator to make sure the eBooks and
content really only go to kids in need. Secondly, though, I want to talk about our
partnership with the publishers to address diverse content this is -- these are just
examples but it's called stories for all and what we have said to the publishers we want
to knock down the barriers, the marketplace barriers to developing diverse content. So
we've had a series of initiatives that I will not drag you through at this moment but they
will be on the final exam. (Chuckles).
>> KYLE ZIMMER: That what we have tried to do is we have tried to incentivise the publishers
to prove to them that there really is a market for high diversity in every category, content
and we're working hard to push that through. We added 650 titles to the site just this
last year And in addition, one last category is in the research world. Ellen Galinski some
of you may know is a child development expert out of New York. We wanted to make her work
accessible to the kinds of institutions we serve. We sat with her, we developed tip sheets
that address -- that made it actionable seven sets of tip sheets and then we married those
tip sheets in with specific children's books so a head start teacher could grab the tip
sheet and be ready to roll within really moments. And we have been working in fact with libraries
on that to distribute them and we have so far I think it's been about eight or nine
months we have done about 290,000 downloads with those tip sheets. 30% in Spanish. So
my time is up. There are many more partnerships possible And I would love to have libraries
and childrens museums even more involved in what we're building.
>> Great, thank you, Kyle. Any clarifying questions? Great. Janet.
>> And Teri, I need you to help me out. I was kind of drafted at last minute. And I'm
really proud to be part of this panel. And Teri has given me her device and my notes
were on that. So she has to log me in. But I'm Janet from the Maine State Library and
Maine is one of those -- thank you so much, Teri. Maine is one of those rural states where
partnerships are so vital to anything we do because we have this large geographic area
and this very small population. So Maine just has a population of 1.3 million.
And thinking about here being in Los Angeles just the population here, it blows my mind.
We're also the least densely populated state east of the Mississippi. We have 16 counties.
We have 260 libraries. And over half of those serve populations under 2500. So that gives
you a little bit of a snapshot. So those partnerships are really necessary
for any kind of successful initiative that we do.
And before I talk about our partnership with Cornerstones and IMLS grant, I wanted to mention
that we just had a great partnership with DHHS in Maine. We're able to get an early
literacy consultant with a partnership with the HHS. So they funded the position for us.
And the idea was to train Maine library staff, child care providers, preschool teachers,
and parents, especially parents in Maine's maternal infant and early child home visiting
program. And the idea was actually to go into the community and bring together the librarians
and the preschool teachers and the child care providers so that they could all work together
for the goal of their community in raising everybody's awareness of those early literacy
skills. 70% of our Maine library directors and staff
don't have degrees in library science. So training is essential to what we do. And that's
been the focus of our early literacy consultant as she's traveled throughout the state this
year. And we do have continued funding through DHHS.
And we might also have funding from state Government because this has been such an important
initiative. As far as Cornerstones of Science, they are
a private nonprofit organization that's worked in Maine since 1999. It was an organization
founded by a gentleman named Lee Grodskins. When he retired from the physics department
from MIT, he came up with this idea of doing science programing in public libraries. And
he started at the Curtis memorial library in Brunswick, Maine. And was very successful
at Curtis memorial and then they started going to other libraries and kind of built on that.
They kind of met a capacity level at some point and weren't getting cooperation from
public libraries who were afraid of that science word. So they reached out to us at the State
Library and state we need help building this program in libraries. They probably had maybe
like ten libraries. So we signed a formal Memorandum of Understanding with Cornerstones
and started working together with what we knew about our public libraries in Maine,
what we knew about the staff capacity, what we knew about the leadership And suddenly
they started growing their program. Right now they are working with over 40 libraries
in Maine. And we are really excited because we got a leadership grant from IMLS to help
us expand the program, engage with more libraries in Maine and also in Massachusetts. The Massachusetts
library of Board of Commissioners kind of operates very differently than the Maine State
Library. So we thought a partnership with them would be really helpful. As we looked
at this program and want to share with other State Library agencies kind of the methods
that we have developed in Maine to engage with libraries of certain sizes and different
capacities. So we have learned a lot in the last years with Cornerstones and will try
to build a national resource I shouldn't say try.
We are going to (Chuckles).
>> But it's basically about building capacity at the local Public Library level to offer
science programing and this is from early literacy -- early ages to adults. And there's
a variety of programs and ways that we work with Cornerstones and one of the ways is through
training. So that libraries learn that there are resources in their communities that they
can go to and it's not only financial but it's also those resources that are related
to science. And is there a company in Maine -- a company in their community that can do
presentations. And they are interested in promoting science as well. So they offer science
cafes we have these great science trunks that are like a program in a box delivered to libraries
one of them of course is on lobster science because it is Maine the most popular one I
think it's the CSI science kit so it's like a crime solver and it's all about DNA. One
of the great things about partnerships is you can solve problems together to Cornerstones
was having a problem with the capacity with the science trunks and we have a scheduling
piece of software at the State Library. So what we did is we took on the responsibility
of creating a scheduling calendar for Cornerstones we put them on our van delivery service so
now the libraries can go to the State Library Web site or the Cornerstones library click
on schedule the trunk and then it's delivered via van delivery service so this is a perfect
way to demonstrate how partnerships can work. Everybody brings a certain amount of strength
to the partnership. So this is one way that we have helped Cornerstones and Cornerstones
helps our public libraries. And I think I'll end there. If there's any questions
>> Great, thank you. Please help me welcome the three panelists.
(Applause). >> So I want to spend -- give you all the
time rather than me, ask questions. Although I do have a few but I would like open it up
to all of you to ask questions, share your own stories lift up other ideas of partnerships
so we learn from
each other. >> Science projects where STEM professionals
aren't involved in any way. And so you know, we have to direct them to resources that already
exist online. Or there are lots of repositories and databases that are already in existence.
So I would just encourage applicants even though it's not the focus for today but when
putting together proposals think about who has the expertise you need whether it's early
learning and cognitive development or STEM expertise or it's art or history, there's
so many people that can work with you who can bring that knowledge and then you can
reciprocate in terms of whatever your strengths are so thank you.
>> Thank you. Other questions? Yes. Here. >> I'm Kathy Robins from Billings, Montana,
on the science trunks, do you have like an inventory list of what's in there? And how
many do you have? So if you provide a science trunk you might
be able to provide it for one person -- is that for one person, is that for a classroom,
what would that be for? >> It's usually for a program at the Public
Library. I magically copied down all of the trunk topics so I'm really happy. Currently
we have butterflies and bugs. Human body, blood and bones. There's a trunk on creativity.
Get a clue, solve a crime. That's the CSI one. Lobster science of course I mentioned
that. Mammal tracks and there's one called paint science that talks about cave paintings
and things like that So there's interactive activities so a librarian
gets all of the instruction. There are books included in part of it, as well. So the books
can be lent out or they can be read as part of a story time. So it's hands-on activities,
instructions for the librarians, the lobster comes with a dressup costume so a kid can
dress up as a lobster. So who doesn't want that? I think the CSI one comes with like
a detective hat so the kids pass it around and stuff like that.
So Cornerstones actually puts this together. And we've been suggesting new topics for them.
So they are thrilled to get suggestions for new topics. And so that's where the interaction
with the libraries as partners is like, oh, you know, we loved the lobster one. Can we
do something -- you know, can you do something on blueberries because blueberries are important
in Maine. So it's greet. They come in these big plastic boxes. And like real industrial
kind of locks and everything on them. So everything is in there. So it's kind of like a program
in a can. And so those are really attractive to our
basic libraries. So even our smallest rural library can get that trunk and deliver it
with confidence. >> SHERRI KILLINS: One of the things to build
on that that we were trying to do in our states have learning standards in K to 12 world you
have heard of Common Core in early learning world there's early learning standards that
go from birth to five one of things we're working hard on our project is how do you
understand those volumes? Because sometimes it's multiple pages. Make it visible to a
librarian. It's only one children's librarian that's got an activity how does she attach
the early learning standard so you might have the kit on lobsters but what early learning
principle, what early learning skill, what early learning knowledge is that child getting
and not only so that the librarian understands it but so you can communicate with the family.
So they come into the library as a good experience but it's also building that core knowledge,
skills and abilities that children need to enter school ready to learn. Not ready to
learn. They are always learning -- >> Ready to succeed. Kyle?
>> KYLE ZIMMER: Just one quick footnote is many people think because the name of the
organization is First Book that all we do is books. And what we really have started
doing very aggressively in the last couple of years is expanding way beyond that. And
so when I hear the list of all the resources and I've heard the examples today of all of
the great things you're doing, I'll give you a couple of quick examples. We heard that
kids were showing up hungry. So we went out and got 30,000 units of long shelf life healthy
foods and made those available. We heard that from our network that kids were
missing school because of not -- during the winter, not having winter coats. So we made
a partnership with Operation Warm and you can buy six great looking coats for kids in
a box for 125 bucks I'm just using those as examples to say we want to be your Labrador
retriever, we want to hear from you, what do you need, what resources do you need and
see if we can go out and broker a deal so that your dollars either are not spent at
all or go much further through us. >> Way in the back and then we'll come to
this third table. >> Hi I'm Judy Reno from Phoenix Public Library.
And I had a question for Kyle. I think that sounds really, really cool. And
I was wondering, are you working with anyone in Arizona? And is there opportunity to do
so? >> KYLE ZIMMER: We may be but I'm not specifically
aware of it. But yes, call me. (Chuckles).
>> There's an invitation. >> KYLE ZIMMER: Quite seriously, I'm very
genuine about it. I think that -- I think that we are a million fold more powerful together
than we are putting detached rescue ropes into the same populations. And the only reason
First Book exists is to serve people like you and your colleagues who are on the front
lines. That is 100% of the reason that we are in business. So absolutely. I'm being
funny about it. But I mean it genuinely. Call me.
>> First Book has been an incredible partner to so many people across the nation. So thank
you, Kyle, for the work you have done. But I think the message here, too, is that there
are so many potential partners for you. So many people that want to be with you hand
in hand, whether it's on early literacy, which is our topic today. But on many other ways
to reach families and to reach children in the way that we need to.
There were two questions on this third table. >> Can I pipe up for a moment first I want
to talk on that First Book train for a minute. Is it on? Yes, it's on. I can vouch for that
First Book readiness to respond because Kyle mentioned the Open eBooks initiative. Do people
here know about that. >> Raise your hand if you know about eBooks.
>> Fabulous. >> Some don't. So that gives me license to
talk about it just for a moment. (Chuckles).
>> We started working together and the White House became interested in an effort to provide
access to a lot of free eBook reading material for low income kids, for kids who needed help
bridging that Digital Divide so we went to where we had been investing and we went to
New York Public Library who was building this wonderful library simplified platform that
is an accessible eBook platform. And we said, can we work together? And they said, yes,
we're in. And then we talked to the Digital Public Library of America, who is all about
community. And we said, can you harvest and unique the great community across the United
States? Get everybody in on this. Because we need to curate the reading material. And
they said, yes, we're absolutely in on this. And then there was the question of, well,
how are we going to find the right kids? The publishers were really excited about this.
And were very willing to give for free. And it ended up being $250 million worth of content
from Harper Collins and the big publishers. Oh, you go to the place that already does
that and does that the best and that was First Book. And Kyle had been to IMLS once. She
didn't really know us. And I called up and said --
>> KYLE ZIMMER: It was great. >> It was a really good meeting. I said, hey,
would you mind? And I cannot tell you the response that I got, which was so we want
this to happen. We will help you in any way. We don't -- you know some partners, they always
need the ego thing. There was none of that there It was truly, we will selflessly help
you in any possible way we can and that was magnificent and awesome and she probably regrets
it now because there's an awful lot of work that we all have to do and I think the partnership
will grow from here but I wanted to say that while I'm talking about the White House partnership
I do want to mention Susan Benton is here and several colleagues that are affiliated
with the American Library Association in some way. We also have the ConnectED Library Challenge
that was launched. Some of you in the room have signed up for it, too, so that's exciting
That was an effort, again, the White House is holding up the work we do and holding up
this wonderful partnership. That was an effort to challenge communities to have the librarian,
the mayor the county, city executive and the school superintendent singular or plural whomever
those three entities are in a community to come together and pledge to get a library
card into the hand of every kid as soon as they are in school. And I think our bigger
goal is to break down barriers within communities. We're talking about it because it's about
the library card. But it's really about letting the kids walk through the community and have
access to all the resources that should be available to them without running into the
silos that are our organizational silos. So we have had a wonderful time getting that
off the ground. Am I forgetting to say anything. We're going to have a convening in the fall
ultimately we would love the whole country to be in on that and I think having the White
House hold that up and helping us knock on the doors of mayors and school superintendents
and say to them, we care about, this make this happen is really giving us a push and
I hope you'll all join us so that was my commercial interruption I'm going to give it back to
the questions. >> Thank you, Maura and I know we're out of
time. And we had two questions. Do I take them? Do I move on? So I think both of you
had questions. This third table from the front. >> I just -- this is a question to any or
all of you because we're talking about cross sector partnerships. If you had an example
of an assumption that you had at the sector that you were working with going in where
that assumption shifted as you began engaging with them.
>> Janet? >> I was just thinking with Cornerstones of
Science we have a telescope project. And part of the training is outreach to organizations
to help train the librarians and families and to do presentations. And I was like are
we really going to get people for free? But the astronomy groups in the state are just
dying to go to the library and they have been very generous not only with their time to
the local public library but they are committed matching funds for our IMLS grant the southern
Maine astronomy group. And it only takes one or two people. But some of them are retired.
And they are passionate. So people that are passionate are really willing to volunteer.
So it's good for our libraries to know you don't always have to pay for somebody to come
and that's part of what's going on with our grant.
>> Thank you. >> SHERRI KILLINS: I wanted to say one thing
that I learned about libraries is that you really -- you are really understaffed in a
lot of ways. And some of what's necessary to do -- remember I'm coming from the state
level not really being in your space. Some of what's necessary to do the work requires
more. And so libraries were able to dig down and give more but we really do have to figure
this out because you are a place and as long as people come to you everything is okay but
when you've got to reach out or do more so some families that don't traditionally have
access or who want access but you have to do it in a different way your greeter might
be different you might have to do it in a different way you might have to shepherd people
until they understand the space it takes more energy you're willing but finding the bandwidth
to do it and getting the professional development and training to know how is missing and one
of the tools we created is about family engagement and helping both libraries, museums and early
childhood systems thinking about what it really means to engage a family and it's not just
being an open space that's available >> Sherri just very quickly can you share
if that toolkit will be available to other states and how people might access that.
>> SHERRI KILLINS: It will be available to all states, available midsummer, it will be
online and of course I'm happy to take calls and talk people through it.
>> Great I'm so sorry we're out of time I want to leave you with one final challenge,
to really, really think about the most vulnerable families, the children and families who we
oftentimes don't remember that they need you. And they are hungry for reaching you, families
that living in housing -- public housing orchids that are in family, friend or neighbor care
lots of people wanting to help and partner with you and three great examples today please
help me thank them once again. (Applause).