Partnering with Your Community

I am impressed by all of the great ideas and action that is coming out of these workshops from Montana library staff. Great! The first Connecting to Spanish Speakers @ Your Library workshop was an in-service day for staff at the Bozeman Public library in October 2007. At that time we formed an Outreach to Latinos Committee (OLC) of staff and volunteers. Today we had our monthly meeting and we are still struggling to bring new Latino patrons into the library.

What I have learned and you can see it also in your posts is the importance of partnering with members of the community to better service Latinos and meet the goals that you set forth in your action plans.

Brett in FCL mentions that he helped some Latinos outside of the library walls but still let them know that FCL has Spanish-speaking staff and provided contact information.

Amy and Carrie at North Valley are working with a Latino/a patron to make connections in the community and invite people into the library.

Dillon is integrating bilingual programing into the summer reading program and making it a part of regular service as well as taking advantage of the expertise of a staff member who speaks Spanish.

These are all great ideas that demonstrate the value of working with the community to introduce the library to the local Latino community.

In Gallatin County, there is a group of service providers that, like Montana libraries, are working to better serve their English Language Learning (mostly Spanish-speaking) clients. This group is CORO (Coalition Of Resource Organizations). I joined this group last summer representing the library when I did my community member interviews. Since that time the Bozeman Library has worked with many different local organizations to promote services.

• Through the Friends of the Library we donate a box of children's books to the Gallatin County Food Bank each month. Books are free for food bank clients and information about the library is provided in each book both English and Spanish. It has become a wildly popular program (the favorite thing about the food bank for many children) and I am working to find funding to purchase books for this program.
• Flyers for our bilingual storyhours are posted at CORO organizations such as the Gallatin Community Clinic, Food Bank, University, etc.
• Barbara Komlos at The Language Center has worked with the library to check translations, and is now volunteering as our storyteller for the bilingual storyhours.
• Professors at the university have worked with the library to provide volunteers, translation help, and help reach out to the Spanish-speaking community.
• We are in the midst of planning a Community Cena (dinner) at the library to be held before the August storyhour. The cena would be a time for Latino families and non-Latino families to have dinner together (a potluck), meet and greet (Free Fun Food Family), become friends, and then attend the bilingual storyhour together. The library is counting on the contacts of CORO members and others to bring everyone in the Gallatin community together.

What ways is your library partnering with your local community to bring in new patrons?