The Prison Library as an Agent of Rehabilitative Change

Many prisoners regret their criminal behavior and resolve to change their ways. Nowhere in the prison is there a more exciting opportunity to get inmates invested in lasting rehabilitative change than the prison library, yet many Departments of Correction undervalue the changed-based potential of both library and Librarian as vital pieces of the rehabilitative puzzle.

Ways to advocate for the library as a program environment (as opposed to being a simple management tool) will be discussed. Library-based programs such as consequential thinking, book discussions, writing-as-therapy, humor-as-therapy in the correctional environment, and the respectful treatment of women will be examined. The instructor will also share examples of course materials, curricula, and post-program data analysis.  

Captioning Instructional Videos

Library staff have found short instructional videos to be an effective way to help readers use resources, even when the library is closed. However, patrons who are deaf or have hearing impairments cannot get the full benefit unless the videos have captions.
Unfortunately, technology has not provided a flawless solution. Speech recognition is still an imperfect tool. Planning and attention to detail are needed to create useful and meaningful captions.
This four week course will introduce some free tools that can be used to compose and synchronize captions for instructional videos. Planning and script preparation will also be explored. Participants will be expected to prepare at least one video with captioning.

Building a Successful Independent Consulting Practice

Are you a subject matter expert who wants to help people and organizations fill a gap in knowledge, skills, or service? This course will guide participants through the exploration and quantification of their uniquely marketable skills and expertise in order to build and launch a successful consulting practice. Using carefully curated resources and experience, the instructor will help each participant design and build a strategy for launching a consulting practice in their area of expertise. This course will cover building a brand, finding a niche to serve, marketing your services, and how to find and land business. Participants will leave with actionable strategies and plans for their own practice. This course is geared towards the independent consultant.

Participants in this course will build and launch their consulting practice through readings, resources, and one-on-one assistance from the instructor. Participants will reflect and analyze their own skills and areas of expertise and apply those to the knowledge of building a successful practice that they learn in this course.

Participants will be expected to spend 1-1.5 hours on the readings, resources, and course information and 1.5-2 hours on the actual process of building their practice and providing feedback to other participants.

Going to Jail: How Juvenile Books Portray the Prison Experience - Spring 2015

This five week course will explore portrayals of the incarceration experience in juvenile and young adult literature. Participants will be assigned to read several books written for young people that include scenes in prison or juvenile detention facilities. Each week a one hour online chat will provide a book discussion about the themes of the books and how they can be used with appropriate readers. The chat can also be a model for librarians who want to lead book discussions for their patrons.

Improving Library Services to People with Disabilities - Fall 2016

It has been more than 25 years since the passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act that outlawed discrimination against people with disabilities in the United States. Libraries have responded with a variety of initiatives. All libraries have a plan for serving people with disabilities, whether it is installation of ramps or creation of special needs story times. But improvements are always possible.
In this four week course, you will evaluate current library accessibility in areas of physical space, collections, communication, staff development, programming and partnerships. You will explore new technologies, such as mobile apps, that are being used by people with disabilities. You will explore how to include patrons in your planning and implementation process. Then you will begin developing your own plan for improving library services to people with disabilities.

An Introduction to Correctional Librarianship

The Reader-friendly Library - evaluating the visitor experience

What does your library offer to somebody in a hurry? Which display works best and how could it do better? What's the first impression people get from your library? Could small changes improve the experience for your visitors? Customer complaints,surveys and load statistics offer limited answers. To improve the library experience for all your visitors, you need objective evidence about how different groups of patrons actually use and experience the space. This course gives you the tools to collect and use that evidence as a basis for making the best investment of your time and effort when making changes.