Innovation Fund
Eugene Public Library Foundation has recently established the Innovation Fund, a new designation of funding from the Frank Falch estate to support Eugene Public Library’s community engagement during COVID-19 with emphasis on serving community members who are often marginalized and/or underserved.
Library staff are able to propose projects that are timely and limited duration. Funded projects will be announced as they are funded.
Mobile WiFi Lending: Through funding from the Foundation’s Innovation Fund and Eugene Metropolitan Rotary Club, Eugene Public Library is partnering with First Place Family Center, White Bird, and 15th Night to pilot the lending of hotspots to families using their facility and services.
Livestreaming Equipment: Virtual access to library programming is more important than ever right now, and we believe it will continue to be important. Even as the pandemic abates, we anticipate shifting into a hybrid virtual/in person programming model, where some community members will feel medically safe attending events, while others will want to continue to participate from home. Staff will have access to portable, quality, easy-to-use equipment they can use whenever they offer a virtual or hybrid event. (From the grant application)
Large Print Juvenile Collection: The number of Large Print books available for children at Eugene Public Library has traditionally been very limited, and the ones that were available were shelved with regular children's fiction and thus very difficult to find. This project is to create a dedicated Juvenile Large Print section and purchase a significant amount of titles to enrich current holdings.
In addition to helping those with vision issues, research is showing how kids with dyslexia and other print disabilities can often benefit from large print materials, too. It is estimated that 1 in 5 children have some form of print disability, so this is a significant number of our patrons. In view of this, we want to make our large print offerings for kids better and easier to locate. We are creating a separate Juvenile Large Print collection to make them more findable, and we also hope to grow from our current very small number of titles to a much richer collection of choices for kids--encouraging that love of reading for those who may be experiencing extra challenges with it, just as we aim to do for all readers with all of our children's materials! (From the grant application)