Colorado: “School Libraries in Boulder County Changing for 21st Century”

From The Daily Camera:

“Kids can prototype and create projects in our library,” said Trail Ridge Principal Eddie Cloke. “It’s a really cool space.”
Both the St. Vrain Valley and Boulder Valley school districts are beginning to make changes to bring their libraries into the 21st century.
In St. Vrain Valley, there’s a library pilot focused on redesigns. In Boulder Valley, the $576.5 million bond issue approved by voters in 2014 gives schools money to make physical changes to library spaces.
The four Boulder Valley schools with major remodels or rebuilds, plus the new K-8 school being built in Erie, are designing new library spaces with innovation as the goal. All the district’s schools also will share a $20 million innovation fund that could be used to update libraries.
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To get more ideas, they looked at Douglas County schools. Linda Conway, Douglas County’s director of library media programming, was hired three years ago to improve and modernize school libraries.
Using a learning commons model, she said, she’s worked with schools on libraries with multiple, flexible learning spaces and access to digital resources 24 hours a day.
Without much extra funding, libraries added wheeled support systems to book shelves instead of buying new shelves and used Plexiglass and other inexpensive materials to create “thinking” walls students could write on.

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Filed under: Funding, Libraries, News, School Libraries