The Friday Grab Bag is a weekly series that highlights fun, unique, and interesting happenings in Colorado libraries, and includes news from the Colorado State Library.
Before we get into the bag, a couple of housekeeping items. First, the Grab Bag will be taking a brief hiatus after this week, returning on July 17. Second, last week the Colorado State Library unveiled the shared Colorado Virtual Events Calendar, and this week we are making it easy for you to promote the calendar within your community to help users find events, tutorials and more via a Social Media Toolkit and Website Integration options. Check it out and if you have any questions, please feel free to contact me at mwood@coloradovirtuallibary.org.
Now let’s open the Friday Grab Bag!
Social Justice by the Book
Join Pueblo City-County Library on July 9 from 2:00-3:00 pm for a Book Talk on Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You, Jason Reynolds’ remix of Ibram X. Kendi’s National Book Award winning Stamped from the Beginning.
Adults are invited to join Douglas County Libraries on the second Monday of each month at 7:00 pm to discuss fiction and nonfiction titles. July 13th’s title is The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander. Email Lisa Casper at lcasper@dclibraries.org the day before for the meeting password and join via zoom prior to 7:00 pm.
Are you passionate about social justice and want to connect with like-minded individuals? Denver Public Library invites adults to meet virtually over tea for a Virtual Social Justice Book Club. On July 22 at 6:00-7:00 pm, join the discussion on Cantoras by Carolina De Robertis. If you haven’t read or finished the book, you are welcomed to join as long as you don’t mind spoilers. Registration required – details on how to meet up online will be sent to the email address included in your registration.
Read diverse titles with your new besties at Boulder Public Library’s Book Queeries Book Club on the first Tuesday of each month from 4:30-5:30 pm starting on August 4. While this is a queer-themed book club, readers across the gender and sexuality spectrum are welcome to attend and engage in fun, respectful dialogue. This group is a space for teens to read stories that might resemble their own experience as well as to discover entirely different perspectives and experiences. Allies are also welcome.
Put a Plant in It
Kids are invited to join Delta County Libraries for Party and Grow with Trolls, a virtual program and take-home activity kit during the week of July 6. Learn how to make an eggshell grass troll; decorate your egg shell with googly eyes and markers to create a troll face and seed grass within. Then, once the grass grows, your troll will have hair! You can cut it, style it, and see how long it gets! Take-home kits can be picked up at all library locations in Delta County the week of July 6 during curbside pickup.
Pikes Peak Library District invites adults to create High Prairie Cat Planters on July 1 from 2:00-3:00 pm. Cut recycled bottles into cute cat (or other animal) shapes to get your container garden started! Participants will pick up program supplies from the library prior to the virtual program by EOB on June 30. Registration required – click HERE to register.
Learning For All
Denver Public Library hosts a virtual three-day Advancing Equity & Inclusion in the Workplace Symposium on July 8-10 from 10:00 am – 4:00 pm. The symposium will be a chance to leverage professional networks across a multitude of fields to dive deeper into particular issues that contribute to success in promoting racial equity & inclusion in the workplace. While the symposium is free and open to the public, the intended audience is folks who have been centering equity, diversity and inclusion (EDI) in the professional work that they do.
How to Ask for $ in Tough Times: 12 Tactics in 24 Minutes | June 30 @ 12:00-1:00 pm MT
This webinar offers an espresso shot collection of ideas and practices to help nonprofit leaders ask for – and secure – the contributions upon which their organizations depend.
Grants & Funding
CHRAB Re-Grant Program
The Colorado Historical Records Advisory Board (CHRAB) recently announced this year’s funding opportunities from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC) for Re-Grants. Administered by the Colorado State Archives, the CHRAB Re-Grant Program will award six grants of $5,000 to applicants around the State of Colorado.
Museums and Libraries in the News
John Denver’s all-denim ski suit is back — and so are many Colorado museums | The Know
John Denver’s rightly legendary, all-denim ski suit is one of the artifacts on loan from the John Denver Estate at a new History Colorado Center exhibition opening next week.
Fewer Crowds, More Hand Sanitizer: Colorado Museums Adjust To New Normal As They Reopen | KUNC
Three months after closing due to the COVID-19 pandemic, museums in Colorado are beginning to reopen their doors, while following guidelines from health officials and Colorado Creative Industries.
What’s New at the Colorado State Library
Learning Opportunities
Library Friends & Foundations Forum: Book Donations & Books Sales During a Pandemic
- July 9 @ 2:00-3:30 pm MT
- Registration required
- Register to receive Zoom login
Library Research Service
Visualizing Data: Color
Colors hold a lot of subconscious “baggage” that data visualization designers use to enhance or skew our understanding of data. This week, LRS unpacks the role color plays when we process visual information.
Colorado Virtual Library
Spark Mindset Cyberspace Remote Camps
Find camp schedule and registration info for Spark Mindset, which offers educational programs to give kids – particularly kids of color and girls – opportunities to learn and earn credentials in the field of cybersecurity.
State Publications Blog
Are you thinking of making a change this year in your job? Check out Library Jobline for hot new library employment opportunities.
- Education and Events Coordinator: Garfield County Libraries / Rifle, CO
- Staff Trainer: Garfield County Libraries / Rifle, CO
- Youth Services Librarian: Bud Werner Memorial Library / Steamboat Springs, CO
- Director of Public Service: Grand County Library District / Granby, CO
- Catalog Associate: Grand County Library District / Granby, CO
- Librarian – Diversity & Inclusion: Jefferson County Public Library / Arvada, CO
- Executive Assistant: High Plains Library District / Greeley, CO
This post is part of the Spotlight on Sharing initiative, which aims to increase the visibility of resource sharing in Colorado libraries. Do you have a story from your library to share? Email Marisa Wood, mwood@coloradovirtuallibrary.org. Also, be sure to follow Colorado State Library on Twitter and Facebook.
- Friday Grab Bag, December 17, 2021 - December 17, 2021
- Friday Grab Bag, December 10, 2021 - December 10, 2021
- Save the Date – Successful Supervision 2022! - December 10, 2021