Sarah, our Community Ambassador at Champaign Public Library, has stayed at CPL and continues to work with teens. She has provided us a short update on the progress since the grant concluded in April 2015.
The major things that have changed since funding was axed was a stronger reliance on volunteers and staff for programming and equipment. The entire teen team has played a part in programming with the cart (see pictures of the stickers included on the cart in this previous Story post), and in gradually getting more time allotted for teen events.
We are also lucky to have volunteers this past year and I suspect many of whom heard about us through my sister (also an active volunteer). We’ve branched off into some of our own ideas that weren’t necessarily grant-approved during the DL4ALL project, but that fit our environment (Kathie, a teen librarian, knits with the kids, for example).
These changes have also been paired with changes higher up at Champaign Public Library. The library currently has an interim director who has been supportive of the work we’ve been doing and has given more room in the schedule for weekly teen events, equipment usage, and storage space. This growing in-house support of what we do, in a more vocalized and action-based way has allowed the teen program here to flourish and grow after the grant.
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