By Jenny Levine |
By Dwight McInvaill
Presented July 24, 2007
"The Carvers Bay Branch is a new public library in a rural, impoverished, and
isolated corner of South Carolina. In many ways, its community has problems
found also in troubled urban areas. The place's 7,000 residents face a terrible
job market with 15% unemployment along with poverty and illiteracy rates both
exceeding 30 percent. When the library opened in 2006 – in this locale where no
library had ever existed before and where only 2% of the population even had
library cards – the hope was that this facility would make a true difference in
transforming the community. A major foundation made it possible for the library
to create a state-of-the-art interactive computer gaming center for teens with
Xbox 360s and Dell gaming PCs. The strategy was to attract high school students
to the new library with the aim of expanding their horizons through developing
the habit of regular public library use. The computer gaming club was an
immediate success. Within a few weeks, over 60 youngsters – mainly
African-American males – were ongoing club members, and by August – after having
been open for only two months – the Carvers Bay Branch Library was featured by
WebJunction as its national Library of the Month. When the Bill and Melinda
Gates Foundation learned of the interactive gaming program's success, the
foundation decided to include the library in a short documentary on innovation
and advocacy that is currently being distributed free of charge to public
libraries, nationwide. To learn more about this exciting endeavor and also to
discover what plans are in the works for future innovation there, please be sure
to attend this session on how a small rural library is making a difference by
using technology and programming vigorously to transform its community." More info....
Listen to an MP3 audio file of this session (38MB, 41:09)
tags: glls2007, gaming in libraries
Presented July 24, 2007
"The Carvers Bay Branch is a new public library in a rural, impoverished, and
isolated corner of South Carolina. In many ways, its community has problems
found also in troubled urban areas. The place's 7,000 residents face a terrible
job market with 15% unemployment along with poverty and illiteracy rates both
exceeding 30 percent. When the library opened in 2006 – in this locale where no
library had ever existed before and where only 2% of the population even had
library cards – the hope was that this facility would make a true difference in
transforming the community. A major foundation made it possible for the library
to create a state-of-the-art interactive computer gaming center for teens with
Xbox 360s and Dell gaming PCs. The strategy was to attract high school students
to the new library with the aim of expanding their horizons through developing
the habit of regular public library use. The computer gaming club was an
immediate success. Within a few weeks, over 60 youngsters – mainly
African-American males – were ongoing club members, and by August – after having
been open for only two months – the Carvers Bay Branch Library was featured by
WebJunction as its national Library of the Month. When the Bill and Melinda
Gates Foundation learned of the interactive gaming program's success, the
foundation decided to include the library in a short documentary on innovation
and advocacy that is currently being distributed free of charge to public
libraries, nationwide. To learn more about this exciting endeavor and also to
discover what plans are in the works for future innovation there, please be sure
to attend this session on how a small rural library is making a difference by
using technology and programming vigorously to transform its community." More info....
Listen to an MP3 audio file of this session (38MB, 41:09)
tags: glls2007, gaming in libraries