I recently read the report published by IMLS,
Museums, Libraries, and 21st Century Skills which is a part of an outstanding initiative which "underscores the critical role our nation’s museums and libraries play in helping citizens build such 21st century skills as information, communications and technology literacy, critical thinking, problem solving, creativity, civic literacy, and global awareness."
The initiative includes 3 parts, all available here
http://www.imls.gov/about/21stCSkills.shtm:
1. The Online Self-Assessment: a brief interactive survey that quickly analyzes an institution’s 21st century strategies and describes next steps for action.
2. The Report: outlines a vision for the role of libraries and museums in the national dialogue around learning and 21st century skills and includes case studies [be sure to read these case studies!] of innovative audience engagement and 21st century skills practices from across the country.
3. The Self-Assessment Tool: allows museums and libraries to determine where they fit on the continuum of 21st century skills operations and programming.
I found numerous parallels to the efforts of the initiative with those of
Project Compass and thought this would be a good place to start a discussion about the long term goals your library has to support the development of patrons' 21st Century Skills beyond the current workforce challenged economic climate and on into the future.
The report identifies the differences between 20th and 21st Century skills, and provides a framework including four skills areas:
- Learning and Innovation Skills
- Information, Media, and Technology Skills
- Life and Career Skills
- 21st Century Themes, including: Global Awareness; Financial, Economic, Business, and Entrepreneurial Literacy; Civic Literacy; Health Literacy; Environmental Literacy
You can see the skill sets cover many of the areas we have traditionally focused on. I'm very excited to see how this framework might help libraries clarify our role and forge potential community partnerships to build 21st C. skills in our communities.
I found these 3 quotes to be particularly powerful:
First an overall call to collaboration:
All libraries and museums—and the people they serve—stand to benefit from becoming more intentional and purposeful about accommodating the lifelong learning needs of people in the 21st century, and doing this work collaboratively in alignment with community needs.
And then more focused on learning, specifically the role we as libraries can play in informal learning to help our communities...
Skills like critical thinking and problem solving are not only relevant for K-12 students and schools. There are millions of adult learners not in formal education programs looking to refine workplace skills. Even school-aged children spend the overwhelming majority of their waking hours in non-school settings, and increasingly they spend this time in organized out-of-school settings such as afterschool, museum, and library programs. In these settings, they develop important skills—such as problem solving, collaboration, global awareness, and selfdirection—not only for lifelong learning and everyday activities, but also for use back in K-12 schools and college classrooms.
And I loved this one that encourages us to
view learning from an “ecological perspective” that involves “life-long,” “life-wide,” and “life-deep” experiences.
The report itself is loaded with other excellent information that can both guide programming as well as advocacy efforts, with clear articulation of the critical value of libraries. I've yet to dive deep into the assessment tools, but kudos to the task force and team member who pulled together the launch of this outstanding initiative!
Read it and tell me what you think!
