Thank you to Gretchen Pruett and Denise Davis for sharing their Edge experiences in today's webinar: Going First - Learning from the Edge Pilot Libraries. The session recording is available now.
What is the Edge Initiative?
The Edge Initiative is a voluntary assessment program that provides libraries with benchmarks, best practices, tools and resources that support continuous improvement and reinvestment in public technology services. Edge helps libraries connect their services to community priorities. A group of pilot libraries has been testing the benchmarks in their libraries and communities. Today's speakers were from pilot libraries. Gretchen Pruett is the director of the New Braunfels Public Library in Texas and Denise Davis is the Deputy Director of the Sacramento Public Library in California.
Seven state library agencies are participating in the current soft launch of the Edge Initiative. The seven state library agencies include: California, Connecticut, Illinois, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, and Texas. Edge will roll out nationally in January 2014.
Not in a soft launch state, but want to get started now? You can access the assessment workbook online. The online assessment tool will be available to you in January 2014 and will be very very similar to that workbook.
What libraries have implemented this?
Denise Davis and Gretchen Pruett each shared their experiences as pilot libraries for the Edge Initiative during today's session. They discussed what they did as participants, the Edge assessment results for their libraries, actions taken because of the results, and responses from stakeholders in their libraries and communities. They also offered advice for libraries who are just getting started with the process.
Other resources shared during today's session include:
As discussed during the session, we're going to follow-up with Sacramento Public Library for more details about their staff training efforts. Watch the TechSoup for Libraries blog for that! If you're interested in that topic, please see also the Tech-Savvy staff webinar.
Want to learn more?
Want to hear from other Edge pilot libraries? Join us on Wednesday, August 21st when we talk to Marcia Johnson, Miami Public Library, Oklahoma, and Dionne Mack, El Paso Public Library, Texas. Register at: https://cc.readytalk.com/r/nd8a6sxq8zau&eom.
Techsoup for Libraries has been hosting Edge webinars for over a year now. These webinars have each featured a different benchmark with examples from libraries that excel in that area. View the archived session descriptions and recordings to learn more.
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