Qué Rica Vida website

The Qué Rica Vida website is General Mills' food and lifestyle website for Spanish speakers, specifically targeting Latina moms. It's maybe a little something to link to on a slow day.

Qué Rica Vida (which translates to “What a Rich and Wonderful Life”) is a program that provides tips on healthy living to the Spanish-speaking population in the United States. It also includes a magazine, health seminars and a Spanish language. 

There's also an app for that.

Two from Roads to Reading

These two opportunities from Roads to Reading do not seem as though they have hugely broad appeal for Connecticut, but really one never knows. 

The Books for All Kids Program provides free books to nonprofits, after-school programs, and child care centers. All book donations are announced through email alerts and are made on a first come, first served basis.

The Annual Competitive Book Donation Program. The Road to Reading's Annual Competitive Book Donation Program donates books to organizations that have a strong focus on remedial reading or tutoring. Organizations must be 501(c)3's and should be located in an under-served community whose population is under 50,000. The books that are available through this program are appropriate for ages 6 months to young adult. Eligible organizations include individual schools, libraries, and childcare centers. Deadline: March 30, 2012. 

IMLS National Leadership Grants

The Institute of Museum and Library Services' National Leadership Grants support projects that have the potential to advance museum, library, and archival practice. The Institute encourages grant proposals that promote the skills necessary to develop 21st century communities, citizens, and workers. Proposals should address key needs and challenges that face libraries, museums, and archives. Successful proposals will be innovative responses to these challenges and will have national impact.

Deadline: 2/1/2012

Next webinar with National Leadership Grants Staff: Wednesday, January 4, 2012, 2PM – 3PM Eastern.

NEH: America's Historical and Cultural Organizations

In the National Endowment for the Humanities' America's Historical and Cultural Organizations grant program, eligible project formats include but are not limited to museum and library exhibitions, interpretive websites and other digital projects, interpretations of historic places, reading and discussion groups, and related programs.

Applicants are encouraged to consider more than one format for presenting humanities ideas to the public. Projects should encourage dialogue, discussion, and civic engagement, and they should foster learning among people of all ages. Humanities projects tailored to particular groups, such as families, youth, seniors, at-risk communities, and veterans are welcomed.

NEH offers two categories of grant: Planning grants, for projects that may need further development before applying for implementation, and Implementation grants which support the final preparation of a project for presentation to the public. 

America’s Historical and Cultural Organizations grants support:

• traveling exhibitions that are presented at multiple venues;
• long-term exhibitions at one institution;
• interpretive websites or other digital formats;
• interpretation of historic places or areas;
• reading and discussion programs;
• panel exhibitions that travel widely, reach a broad audience, and take advantage of complementary programming formats (e.g., reading and discussion series, radio, or other media) to enhance the visitor experience; and
• other project formats that creatively engage audiences in humanities ideas.

Deadline: 1/11/2012.

Free 1/19 Webinar: Caregiver Resources

C'mon, do something great on Thursday the 19th of January. If you can't make it to the Connecticut State Library for the Third Thursday program (held in the Museum of Connecticut History), attend this FREE InfoPeople webinar about Caregiver Resources. Learn how we can help the helpers.

Of interest to public library staff, including reference librarians or reference desk staff, adult and teen services librarians, and staff from organizations who provide health information to consumers/the public.

Registration deets 

A recent study on caregiving reported a startling statistic: during any given year, more than 65 million people, (nearly 30% of the U.S. population), provide care for a chronically ill, disabled or aged family member or friend and spend an average of 20 hours per week providing that care. Other findings show that these efforts take numerous tolls on caregivers, including extraordinary time demands, financial burdens, and the physical and mental health status. Impacts on employers and the workplace are significant, in terms of lost productivity, reduced time at work, and increased health care costs.

This webinar will give library staff practical knowledge about the information needs and the role of the caregiver. Topics to be covered will include:

What the caregiver needs to know and do – resources for:
•    Planning
•    Decision making
•    Working with the healthcare team
•    Day-to-day tasks required to care for the loved one

Health and wellness of the caregiver:
•    Finding support groups
•    Tips for managing stress
•    Coping with feelings of anger, sadness, and grief

Tips and strategies for working with library employees who are caregivers

At the end of this one-hour webinar, participants will:
•    Understand the spectrum of caregiving topics, from daily tasks to the issues and challenges facing people who are in caregiver situations
•    Be aware of caregiver resources for specific conditions, such as Alzheimer’s disease
•    Be able to find resources regarding financial issues and housing decisions
•    Be able to provide support resources for the health and wellbeing of the caregiver

Webinars are free of charge and registration is only done on the day of the event on the WebEx server. No passwords are required.

National School Library Media Program of the Year (NSLMPY) Award

The NSLMPY Award honors school library media programs enabling students and staff to be effective users of ideas and information. The Award recognizes exemplary school library media programs that are fully integrated into the school's curriculum.

The NSLPY Award, guided by AASL's Empowering Learners: Guidelines for School Library Programs, recognizes school library programs that meet the needs of the changing school and library environment.

These programs empower learners to be critical thinkers, enthusiastic readers, skillful researchers and ethical users of information. 

Each winning program (there will be 3) will receive a $10,000 prize donated by Follett Library Resources.

Deadline: 1/2/2012

Ezra Jack Keats Foundation Library Mini-grant Program

As noted here and on the ‘additional grants’ page, the Ezra Jack Keats Foundation Mini-grant program awards funds to programs that encourage literacy and creativity in children.

Multiple awards of $500 each are available. Public schools and libraries are eligible to apply.

Deadline: March 15, 2012.

Sparks! Ignition grants from IMLS

As noted on the ‘Additional Grants’ site, the Sparks! Ignition Grants for Libraries and Museums are a special funding opportunity within the IMLS National Leadership Grants program. The next due date is February 1, 2012.

These grants of up to $25,000 encourage libraries, museums, and archives to test and evaluate specific innovations in the ways they operate and the services they provide.

Sparks Grants support the deployment, testing, and evaluation of promising and groundbreaking new tools, products, services, or organizational practices. You may propose activities or approaches that involve risk, as long as the risk is balanced by significant potential for improvement in the ways libraries and museums serve their communities.

Successful proposals will address problems, challenges, or needs of broad relevance to libraries, museums, and/or archives.    

Past awardees have interesting sounding projects; North Carolina is developing an open source software tool, Texas is creating an online repository where student-created book reviews, reports, and promotional videos can be accessed online across all school libraries through the district's catalog system, and Seattle is implementing an interactive tool designed to cultivate teens as active contributors to, rather than passive consumers of, popular culture.

Donald G. Davis Article Award

The Donald G. DavisArticle Award is presented by the Library History Round Table of the AmericanLibrary Association every second year to recognize the best article written in English in the field of United States and Canadian library history including the history of libraries, librarianship, and book culture. The facts.
Deadline: January 13, 2012.

Exciting? Welll....no one ever entered the field of librarianship for the excitement. Last year's winning article stars the Hartford Public Library's very own Caroline Hewins circa 1882.

2010's winner was Surveying the Field: The Research Model of Women in Librarianship, 1882-1898

by Kate McDowell, Graduate school of Library and Information Science at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Her article was published in The Library Quarterly, Vol. 79, No. 3, (2009): 279-300. 

Abstract: "Women who promoted library services to children in the United States in the late nineteenth century introduced the systematic use of survey research on library practice to the field of professional librarianship. They created a series of qualitative survey‐based reports, the Reading of the Young reports, which were presented at ALA conferences from 1882 to 1898. These reports both assessed the current state of and promoted the development of services to youth. The research model they developed was adopted by other women and men in librarianship for research on other aspects of the emerging field of public library service. The discourse of librarianship had been previously based on individual expertise, and their research model changed the field in two ways: first, by gathering empirical evidence about library practice, and second, by introducing a collaborative model of discourse. These findings about the influence of women during the early years of librarianship call for reexamination of historical explanations for feminization of the field."

Bogle Pratt International Travel Fund

The Bogle Pratt International Travel Fund awards $1,000 to an ALA personal member to attend their first international conference.it is sponsored by the Bogle Memorial Fund and the Pratt Institute School of Information and Library Science.

Deadline: January 1, 2012

Here's why the award exists: "In recognition of Sarah Bogle's international activities, her friends wished the Bogle fund's income to support an international-study fellowship which would enable the U.S. and Canadian librarians to study abroad and non-Canadian international librarians to study in the United States or Canada."

 VROOM! I'm off the librarian conference!