Communities+Libraries: A Community-First Process provides the time, space, and structured process for practicing our philosophy with your community through mentored community-library organization teams. This Guidebook gives you an in-depth view of a C+L implementation. Although there is a set of minimum requirements your program must meet to be a C+L program, there is a universe of customizations you can (and should) employ to make it relevant to local participants.
The C+L program:
The C+L program curriculum is woven together from five core learning threads, whole systems, change agentry, community engagement, partnerships, and project development. None of these threads are treated in a separate and distinct module apart from the other learning. Rather, using project based instructional design, every time teams get together they are interacting with each thread in either their live session, webinar, or cohort phone call.
Depending on where in the arc of learning your program is, will determine how heavily the session explicitly focuses on a core thread. For example, pre-launch learning includes a lot of basic familiarity with whole systems concepts because we’ve found that they are new for a lot of people. And as the formal instructional program comes to a close, around twelve months later, the explicit focus is on project management without program support.
C+L is intended to follow open pedagogy practices and we want you to figure out how best to do the program in a way that makes the most sense for your region. To support your re-mixing efforts while keeping fidelity to the core work required by the program, we’ve listed core conceptual understandings, key skills, and assessment practices for each of the learning threads. So if in your region you decide to launch focusing on skills related to implicit bias and change agentry rather than whole systems and community engagement, as we suggest, you’ll have a global view of your re-worked timeline.
In The Curriculum section of The Guidebook, we’ll note which skills must be practiced in real-world external to the team’s own organizations for you to count the skill as practiced. C+L isn’t just a sandbox. For learners to challenge long standing systems of work these new practices must be real and relevant experiences building on an outcome they are motivated by: their community-based project.
We’ve seen the most resistance in the community engagement practice of doing Ask Exercises (Harwood/ALA, 2014) with strangers. Pushing past fear barriers and discomfort while in an environment of support with a mentor and your whole cohort experiencing similar challenges improves the likelihood that the skill will truly become a part of the participant’s tool-box. You do your participants a disservice if you shield them from discomfort and you will not be implementing a C+L program.
The C+L program timeline is based on the skills and conceptual understandings that need to be acquired by a group. Face to face interaction, cohort peer and mentor support, and individual reflection are all a part of the process to give learners enough support that they are able to engage with concepts and practices that are initially challenging or uncomfortable.
The Curriculum is laid out according to the following parameters:
In Designing Local Implementation, we’ll walk you through the give and take on each of these program elements. There are a set of minimum requirements for your implementation in order to receive our support and to consider your customization a C+L program.
Activating systems of mutual aid is a key component of what makes C+L as a program successful for participants and their communities. Although we mention customization a lot, it is important for you to know the wealth of resources available to you when you consider implementation.
Guidance & Experience
The Guidebook
The Curriculum
In order to receive the support listed above, call your work a C+L program, and reap the community-wide rewards of this meaningful work, we ask you for some commitments.
C+L requires the sponsoring organization to:
Local program design will be:
Curriculum must incorporate all core learning threads: details on flexibility and required content in The Curriculum section of The Guidebook.
Communities+Libraries is a complete process. Can you take these materials but not do a Communities+Libraries program? Sure! We’ve heard from many organizations and colleagues who want to do a “C+L Lite”. You can do whatever you want, but you can’t call it a Communities+Libraries program because you aren’t committing to this process - with all its discomfort, challenge, joy, and deep satisfaction.
Yes, you can:
No, you can’t:
A successful project with long lasting implications is typically accomplished through solid coordination and hearty collaboration. Below, listed in order according to who we think comes first in the process of development, are all of the named folks who will make implementation of C+L a reality in your locality. You’ll find self-assessments for each of these roles in the following sections, according to their role.
Program coordinator will coordinate and administer local program implementation, including the process by which session facilitators, team mentors, and participating teams are invited and chosen. Est. Time Commitment: Minimum of 1-3 hours (average) per week; 15-18 months.
Mentors will actively engage in both support and productive guidance with their teams by listening carefully and redirecting work toward practices with broader involvement. Est. Time Commitment: 1-3 hours per week; 14-15 months.
Community & Library Team Members will participate in all live sessions, cohort calls, and mentoring sessions as full partner and collaborator with their community partner. Est. Time Commitment: 4-7 hours per week; 13 months.
Workshop facilitators will interpret the curriculum for local needs while maintaining fidelity to the core beliefs of C+L. Est. Time Commitment: 10-18 hours per workshop, depending on familiarity with material and customizations involved.
Slow-down Guides are people who have developed or participated in C+L implementations and sit in on live sessions (in-person and/or on web calls) to help slow down participant thinking for deeper understanding of work through reflective questioning. They don’t have a team or a mentor.
Observers are people interested in gaining familiarity with the program and are included in live sessions contingent on invitation or permission of the cohort. They don’t have a team or a mentor.