Tag Archives: Advocacy

Advocacy, CMLE, Communication, Programs

Tomorrow: Location change! Postcard Party held at CMLE HQ instead

While we are definitely disappointed after looking at the weather forecast for tomorrow (chilly with a side of rainy) we will not be discouraged from our library advocacy efforts! Keep in mind this is Banned Books Week, and writing to library stakeholders about the importance of libraries is a great way to celebrate the right to read!

Stop by our CMLE office tomorrow between 11am – 1pm (although we’re here all day!) to fill out postcards to send to legislators, stakeholders, school board members, principals, and anyone else that needs to learn about the value of libraries. As an additional treat, Official Office Dog Lady Grey will be in attendance to offer encouragement!

We’ll have the postcards, sample text you can use, library facts, and of course, snacks. We will mail your completed postcards too.

Hope to see you tomorrow! We are located inside the cmERDC building at 570 1st St. SE St. Cloud MN 56304. The photo is the outside of our building.

Advocacy

Next Tuesday: Library Advocacy Postcard Party in the Park!

We don’t mean to alarm you, but since the earliest reported measurable snowfall in Minnesota was on September 14th, 1964, you should probably make the most of our currently comfortable and snow-free outdoor situation! Looking for a way to embrace this? Come to CMLE’s Postcard Party in the Park!

We host our Library Advocacy Postcard Parties several times each year in order to contact library stakeholders to remind them just how valuable and important libraries are to their communities. We mean all types of libraries: public, academic, special, and school.

For this postcard party we are focusing on local officials and decision makers. That means school boards, city council members, principals, and more. We will again provide library advocacy postcards, postage, and yummy snacks to fuel your advocacy efforts! If you are unsure of the identity of your local officials, do some research beforehand, otherwise we’re happy to help you out.

We look forward to seeing you next Tuesday! (If you can’t make it to the Gardens, stop by CMLE HQ and fill out a few postcards and we’ll get them mailed for you).

Advocacy, CMLE, Communication, Programs

Two Upcoming CMLE Social Events!

There are so many reasons September is great: back to school, pumpkin spice lattes, and TWO opportunities for you to connect with other awesome library folks! We want to meet in different places, so we can try out new things, and we can be closer to different members at different times.

On Tuesday, September 25th, we’ll be having a Postcard Party in the Park! Join us at Munsinger Gardens in St. Cloud from 11-1pm and let’s do some library advocacy! We provide postcards and postage, along with sample text, and we write to our legislators and local decision makers to urge them to support all types of libraries.

 

And on Sunday, September 30th, we’re doing something a little extra special: having tea! Join us at the Mad Hatter Restaurant, in Anoka at 10:30am. We do ask that you RSVP if you plan to join us for this event. We’ll talk libraries, hear about summer adventures, and enjoy delicious refreshments!

 

We hope to see you at one or both of our events. One of our goals as a multitype system is to connect members of the library community with each other, to network and share ideas and challenges. We can’t wait to see you!

Advocacy, Programs

Advocate for libraries at our Postcard Party

Our next library advocacy Postcard Party will be on Tuesday, September 25th from 11-1 (feel free to come a little early, or stay a little late, we’re flexible!) We will be having a lunchtime Postcard Party at the lovely Munsinger Gardens in St. Cloud.

Why do we hold these events? School, public, academic, special libraries and archives all serve important roles and assist their communities in different ways. Libraries deserve funding and support, so let’s spread that message!

For this postcard party we are focusing on local officials and decision makers. That means school boards, city council members, principals, and more. We will again provide library advocacy postcards, postage, and yummy snacks to fuel your advocacy efforts! If you are unsure of the identity of your local officials, do some research beforehand otherwise we’re happy to help you out.

Hope to see you there!

Advocacy

Advocacy Alchemy: Find out where candidates stand on library issues before the election

Each week we will share one tip – usually something simple and easy to do – that will help you build your advocacy skills. Why Alchemy? Because libraries are wonderful and not enough people know about the breadth and depth of library work. When we mix together all the different small things we are doing to advocate, the result in library support will be worth its weight in gold!

To be a good member of the library profession you need to be advocating for yourself, for your organization, and for your profession. It does not matter one single bit what job you have, what your training in libraries may be, or what kind of library you are in. If you are in a library, we want to help you advocate!

This week we are sharing this article from District Dispatch all about effective advocating for libraries before an election takes place. The author lives in Maryland and before their primary election, he reached out to candidates running for office to find out where they stood on issues related to libraries. This author specifically mentions public libraries, but you can edit the language to include the type of library you work in. (You can read the full article to see the email he sent to the candidates). He heard back from a good number of them and recorded their responses. Based on his results, he also came up with some ideas to improve this process in the future.

The author offers these words of advice:

“No matter how we as librarians approach candidates, keep two goals in mind: alerting them to the constituency for public libraries, and electing officials who will be sympathetic to our concerns. That way, when it’s time to approach them about funding and policy decisions, we’ll know where they stand, and we’ll be able to anticipate how they’ll respond.”

Check out the full article here.