'Check In' to participate in a free webinar for YALSA’s Teen Tech Week™

CHICAGO– Visit the Young Adult Library Services Association’s (YALSA) 2013 Teen Tech Week™ website, www.ala.org/teentechweek, to take part in the annual celebration of digital literacy and technology via the library and receive free registration for a webinar highlighting the hot topic of maker spaces.

Teen Tech Week is March 10-16, 2013, with a theme of Check In @ your library, which encourages libraries to throw open their physical and virtual doors and showcase the outstanding technology they offer for teens and their families, from services such as online homework help and digital literacy-focused programs to resources like e-books, movies, music, audiobooks, databases and more.

The free webinar "Maker Spaces 101, Teens, and You" will take place from 2 - 3 p.m. EST, on Feb. 7, 2013. Discover how these new community spaces are engaging teens, encouraging research and helping libraries provide more value to their community members. Hillary Kolos, director of Digital Learning at DreamYard, will guide participants through teen content and technology spaces. Attendees will also learn how to create a maker center with a limited space and budget, how to apply maker space principles to their current programming and take away ideas for new teen spaces.

Teen Tech Week is a national initiative sponsored by the Young Adult Library Services Association and is aimed at teens, their parents, educators and other concerned adults. The purpose of the initiative is to ensure that teens gain the digital literacy skills they need—with the help of libraries—in order to be successful in school and prepared to participate in a 21^st century workforce.

For more than 50 years, YALSA has worked to build the capacity of libraries and librarians to engage, serve and empower teens. For more information about YALSA or to access national guidelines and other resources go to www.ala.org/yalsa, or contact the YALSA office by phone, 800-545-2433, ext. 4390; or e-mail: yalsa@ala.org.