Month: September 2019

Join SustainRT Online Education Committee for an encore presentation from the 2019 ALA conference.

Growing Communities Together: Libraries and Gardens

Time: October 3, 2019, 1-2pm CST

Presenters: Kathy McKay, Pete Villasenor, Meg Wilson, Carrie Banks

Register, at: https://forms.gle/dp1sUXMSdyGFY6Ae8

Description: Curious about the green things outside the library’s windows? Or are you craving green things outside the library’s windows? Find out more about how libraries are are embracing gardens. Are you interested in LEED certification or just making your library more sustainable? Does your local food pantry need fresh produce? Are the children in the children’s room getting antsy? Are your teens bored? Does your ESL class need a focus? Do your students need a break? Or a hands-on science activity? Gardens are the answer. Learn from model programs around the country. Hear from Peter Villasenor, Branch Manager at Oakland Public Library’s Cesar Chavez Branch, about their bilingual seed library and container garden. Explore the National Library of Medicine’s healing garden with the Master Gardener who tends it. Discover the 17 indoor gardens of the Gwinnett County Public Library, you will be amazed by their harvests. Take home your very own seeds to get you started on your own garden. Remember when you have a library and a garden, you have everything you need!

It is with much relief and hopeful anticipation for the year ahead that we report  SustainRT is once again sustainably staffed! After a tumultuous winter and early spring (marked by multiple leadership departures), a successful spring election and a period of intense committee volunteer recruitment resulted in a re-energized SustainRT Board and six fully staffed committees. We are especially delighted to report that SustainRT finally reached the membership threshold in 2018 (membership equivalent to at least 1% of personal ALA memberships) that qualified us to elect our first dedicated ALA Councilor in Spring 2019.

In spite of the administrative shakeup of the past year, good things did happen with SustainRT this past year. The Membership Committee, with the help of SustainRT’s first LIS intern, launched a mentoring program in late Spring 2019. The Online Education and Programming Committees launched multiple virtual and in-person educational opportunities. The Booklist Committee launched the first, annual SustainRT “Top 10” list of recommended books for children about the environment, playing in nature, gardening, and more, and the Environmental Scan Taskforce launched the Sustainable Libraries Database in  Zotero (submissions are always welcomed). The Governance Committee, with the help of SRRT’s Al Kagan, worked to help ALA Endowment Trustees consider the advantages to more ESG investments for the ALA endowment and took the lead on the ALA 2019 Annual SustainRT Chair’s program on carbon offsets for travel.

If you are interested in the work of SustainRT, please join us in the year ahead!

Uta
SustainRT Coordinator
www.ala.org/rt/sustainrt

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Uta Hussong-Christian
Associate Professor  | Science Librarian
Oregon State University