Collection Equity Award - Springfield Public Library

This award will be used to increase the Springfield Public Library current biomedical/health collection, primarily in Spanish and English by:

 Part 1: Examining the current collection to determine its current levels of diversity and literacy. Once complete the audit will allow the library to:

• Determine which community groups are under-represented in the biomedical/health collection;
• Determine which health topics need greater coverage in the collection;
• Purchase a range of items across different media types to be able to best serve differing levels of literacy – and in particular medical literacy – across our patron group, once part 2 (below) is also completed.

Part 2: Building off new and expanded community outreach opportunities:

Recently the library has expanded on past targeted outreach and partnerships with local non-profits and government agencies and begun offering pop-up libraries at community festivals, food bank days etc.  At these events attendees can sign-up for library cards and immediately borrow materials available at the event.  To best utilize this grant library staff will conduct reference interviews with attendees to determine the topics and issues they would want to see featured in the library.  In addition, library staff will discuss the health needs and literacy of potential attendees with participant organizations and develop the collection accordingly.  This information will – with the audit – be used to guide the library staff towards the best materials to add to the collection.  These materials would then be highlighted at upcoming pop-up libraries aimed at target populations as well as being used significantly in both physical and digital displays and offerings by the library.