Annual Conference Session

Community Engagement Table Talks: Using an Engagement Tool to Talk about Community Engagement

ALA Unit/Subunit: PPO
Cost: Included with full conference registration.
Open/Closed: Open

Community engagement is here to stay. Have you dabbled (or are you thinking about dabbling) in community engagement efforts for your library? Or maybe you’re already a pro? Perhaps your library has been working diligently with one dialogue and deliberation model, but you're curious about what else the field has to offer?

In a Table Talk format, you and other professionals from across the country will answer these questions together: What have you learned from your community engagement efforts? How does community engagement change the day-to-day reality at your information organization? In facilitated small groups, you will connect and chat with peers to discuss different community engagement models, including Everyday Democracy, Conversation Cafe and the Harwood Institute for Public Innovation; challenges we face in engaging our communities; what worked and what didn't; what resources are available; and sustaining ourselves. This program is offered as part of Libraries Transforming Communities: Models for Change, an initiative of ALA and the National Coalition for Dialogue & Deliberation (NCDD), with support from IMLS. Learn more at ala.org/LTC.