#LISprochat lead-in - topic & questions for Mon Dec 11 2017 - 8:30pm ET

via Jukka Pennanen

TOPIC

Library advocacy - what does that mean and what does it do?

I'm two weeks into a new volunteer role that I took on in the evenings when I get home from work. I volunteered to become the new Library Advocacy Researcher for the Harry Potter Alliance. So this topic is definitely informed by that new gig. I've been doing a lot of thinking about what library advocacy actually is, what library advocates do, and where to find any resources that exist for them. Especially outside of America, most of the advocacy efforts I see and hear about relate to American libraries and/or the ALA - EveryLibrary comes to mind immediately when I think of library advocacy for example. There's a great primer article from June of this year by Shannon Maughan on Publishers Weekly called Library Advocacy Efforts Gain Steam.

PLEASE REMEMBER THAT WE'VE CHANGED THE TIME TO 8:30PM ET!

QUESTIONS

We post the questions here in advance of the chat so you can decide whether or not this topic is of interest to you and/or prepare your answers in advance.

Q1 What does library advocacy mean to you? What are some areas of library land we need to specifically advocate for?

Q2 What are your go-to resources for finding out information about library advocacy issues and activities?

Q3 Have you ever been directly involved in library advocacy? How? Where? What did you do?

Q4 What library advocacy communities if any are you a part of?

PLEASE CONSIDER JOINING IN ON TWITTER AT 8:30 PM ET NEXT MONDAY, DECEMBER 11 USING THE #LISPROCHAT HASHTAG.