As our business has shifted, I haven’t been blogging much here, but we have been up to some good work!

The Creativity in a Box program that we started in 2016 in Portal was expanded county-wide. We are putting maker boxes in eight libraries around the country and will be doing workshops and producing “workshop in a box” kits for use in the summer of 2019.

We have also continued the oral histories that were a part of this original project. Enthusiastic volunteer support has allowed this work to continue beyond our initial grant funding. The community has been very appreciative of the collection we are building. We’re even talking about expanding this work to other nearby communities.

An oral history recording from Rodeo, NM resident Junior Gomez

The funded stage of the Free Book Box project concluded in 2018 and was a great success. Now we are continuing the work through a combination of volunteer and county support. Book donations have continued to be strong, so we have no ongoing book costs. There are 10 of these boxes in our very rural county.

A new project that started in 2018 is a Digital Literacy Center at the Huachuca City Library. The goal of this project is to increase digital literacy skills through a series of learning opportunities provided to adults and teens in Huachuca City.

Funded through a grant, we are purchasing hardware, developing curriculum, hosting a series of workshops and drop-in sessions, and providing ongoing support for skills development. We are covering a huge breadth of technology skills from basic Internet use to social media to small business marketing.

This has been a fun project for me because it is a different audience than I usually work with. Most of our participants have been older folks with very basic tech skills, and their primary interest has been in mobile phone topics. As with every other project I work on, I’m learning a lot too.

We’re excited about 2019 with the opportunity to continue this work and to pursue new projects!

2018 Year in Review

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