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A Community Action Toolkit
Are you a librarian working to bring your community together? Are you a parent/ caregiver who wants to make sure your child's curiosity, intellectual freedom, and reading life is as rich, and as powerful as possible? Are you tired of efforts by small and loud voices who want to take over your parental voice and your child's rights? Then we are here to help! Welcome!
The Get Ready, Stay Ready: Community Action Toolkit is an effort by a group of parents and librarians who believe that the power is in community, in togetherness, in a collective outcry and a collective pushback against those who want to erase our stories , our history, our existence. Here you will find curated resources including scripts for public speaking and writing, fantastic video presentations, training materials equipping you to learn more about (and fight back) censorship's impact on education and society, tools for civic engagement, and a network of organizations across the country that are determined to preserve your child's right to a high-quality education through intellectual freedom.
Why is Your Voice, Your Actions, Your Involvement Needed? Read "Playing Catch-Up to the Censors, the Fight for the Freedom to Read Needs a Grassroots Revolution" by Kara Yorio, for a clear explanation on why your effort is needed more than ever!
Each tile below will link you to a collection of resources we reviewed and selected to help you become a powerful advocate for your child. Click on each one to access these resources. Get Ready, Stay Ready is an on-going effort and we invite you to recommend resources for inclusion and sharing. Please check back often, and share widely. We are the majority.
Library Org Resources
Civic Engagement
Trainings and Short-Courses
Webinars and Videos
Stuff You Should Read
LGBTQIA+ Support
Resources for Diverse Collections
Letters, Templates, & Guides
Media for Sharing & Advocacy
Mini-Grant Application
Meet the team.
Valerie Byrd Fort
Project Director
VBF is an Instructor for the School of Information Science at the University of South Carolina, a Ph.D. student in Language & Literacy at USC, and the Coordinator for Cocky's Reading Express, USC's Literacy Outreach Program.
Alli Harper
Team Member
A community organizer, attorney, and queer mom to two kids, Alli Harper is the founder and owner of OurShelves, a diverse children's books subscription service and advocacy effort.
Stacy Collins (she/they)
Team Member
Stacy is the Instruction Librarian and Geographer-at-Large at the Oliver Wendell Holmes Library, Phillips Academy. She was named a 2021 Mover & Shaker.
Sherry Neal
Team Member
After more than two decades as a lawyer assisting families with adoption matters, Sherry has pursued a Masters in Library and Information Science at USC and works as a middle school librarian in Atlanta, Georgia.
Dr. April Dawkins
Team Member
Dawkins is an assistant professor in the Department of Library and Information Science at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. April's research focuses on intellectual freedom issues including self-censorship, access and equity, and privacy.
Dr. Lucy Santos Green
Team Member
A parent and former school librarian, Green is the Director of the School of Library and Information Science at the University of Iowa. Lucy's research focuses on school library services to marginalized populations, technology-enabled inquiry learning, and digital learning.
Cynthia Richardson Johnson
Team Member
Cynthia is an 18 year veteran K-12 teacher with 10 years of experience as a school librarian. She is an Information Science PhD student at the University of South Carolina.
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