Engaging AZ Public Libraries as Community Hubs for Citizen Science

Through citizen and community science, people engage in events, projects and programs that can
directly improve their health. Increasingly, libraries are becoming community hubs for citizen and
community science facilitating participation among UBRs and others.

The project aims to train and engage librarians and staff as facilitators and conduits of citizen science to reach and engage more people in understanding threats to environmental determinants of health and participating in projects that aim to address those threats (including external physical, chemical and biological factors that can influence adverse impact to their well-being and human health). Through this project, 22 public libraries (selected from a combination of more than 90 AZ libraries currently circulating citizen science kits through the Libraries as Community Hubs for Citizen Science and others in targeted, rural locations) will be selected to attend and participate in a symposium at the Citizen Science Association conference and participate in required pre-conference trainings and post-conference activities designed to engage their library users in local citizen science at their libraries.

This project builds on the growing “National Community and Citizen Science Library Network,” and
related resources supported by IMLS, two popular training programs funded by the NNLM Region 3
(“Foundations of Citizen Science” and “Libraries as Community Hubs for Citizen Science”), and Spanish language activities, funded by NNLM Region 3, designed to supplement a citizen science project tracking the changing population of pollinators as important food sources. It also expands engagement in the NLM investment through ASU and SciStarter for Citizen Science Month. Our proposed project will leverage these resources and networks and capitalize on the unique opportunity to include our participating librarians in the National Citizen Science Association Conference taking place at Arizona State University in May.