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ViewAttendees 15

Learning Lab

Community Outreach and Engagement

Knowledge of the Community: What It Is and How To Measure It

Sunday, January 21, 2024
11:15am – 12:15pm EST
Location: Baltimore Convention Center, 343-344
Level of Participation: High

    Content Leader(s)

  • Nichelle M. Hayes

    President
    Black Caucus of the American Library Association

  • Deborah Robinson

    Resaerch Investigator
    Insitute for Social Research, University of Michigan

    • Primary Contact(s)

  • Deborah Robinson

    Resaerch Investigator
    Insitute for Social Research, University of Michigan

Have you been told that you need to gain knowledge of the community, but you don’t know how to do that? Learn about the development of the Knowledge of the Community Scale and how it can impact your public library. The 2019 National Impact of Library Public Programs Assessment identified nine competencies of programming librarians, and Knowledge of the Community was one of those identified. A series of Focus Groups with librarians was held in conjunction with a current IMLS-funded research project, Developing a Model of Black History Month (BHM) Programming in Public Libraries. This Learning Lab will review the findings from the Focus Groups, allow participants to share their experiences related to knowledge of the community, and discuss barriers to gaining this important competency. We will also share the results from the first pilot in developing a psychometrically sound scale that libraries nationwide can eventually use to measure

Learning Objectives:

  • Learn what other librarians from across the country said about gaining knowledge of the community via community outreach and community engagement.
  • Compare their libraries’ community outreach and community engagement strategies with preliminary findings from the Black History Month study and with participants in the Learning Lab session.
  • Discover and discuss with peers various barriers to gaining knowledge of the community and how to overcome such barriers.