The National Leadership Grants for Libraries Program (NLG-L) supports projects that address critical needs of the library and archives fields and have the potential to advance practice and strengthen library and archival services for the American public.
Donor Name: Institute of Museum and Library Services
State: All States
County: All Counties
Territory: Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia, and the Republic of Palau
Type of Grant: Grant
Deadline: 09/20/2023
Size of the Grant: $50,000 – $1,000,000
Grant Duration: 3 years
Details:
The mission of the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) is to advance, support, and empower America’s museums, libraries, and related organizations through grantmaking, research, and policy development.
Goals and Objectives
This program is designed to support projects of national impact that address critical needs of the library and archives fields and have the potential to advance practice in these professions to strengthen library and archival services for the American public. Projects are expected to:
- propose far-reaching impact to influence practice across one or more disciplines within the libraries and archives fields;
- reflect a thorough understanding of current practice, knowledge about the subject matter, and an awareness of and support for current strategic priorities in the field;
- use collaboration to demonstrate field-wide buy-in and input, and access to appropriate expertise; and
- generate results such as new models, new tools, research findings, services, practices, and/or alliances that can be widely used, adapted, scaled, or replicated to extend and leverage the benefits of federal investment.
Applications to IMLS should both advance knowledge and understanding and ensure that the federal investment made generates benefits to society. Specifically, the goals for this program are to generate projects of far-reaching impact that:
- Build the workforce and institutional capacity for managing the national information infrastructure and serving the information and education needs of the public
- Objectives:
- Develop or enhance replicable library and archives programs, models, and tools to support learning. Topics addressed may include, but are not limited to, informal STEM or other types of participatory learning; community or citizen science; community and expert narratives; early learning; workforce development; and digital, information, health, financial, media, civic, and other types of literacies
- Collaborate with formal and/or informal learning organizations to incorporate promising practices from allied domains into library and archives services. Partners may include, but are not limited to, museums, school systems, universities, extension programs, youth-serving organizations, departments of correction, and workforce or economic development organizations
- Create and/or facilitate opportunities for continuous learning for families, groups, and individuals of diverse cultural and socioeconomic backgrounds and needs. These may include, but not limited to, young children and their caregivers, tweens and teens, un- and under-employed adults looking to make career transitions or re-enter the workforce, veterans, immigrants and refugees, individuals with disabilities, English-language learners, and senior citizens
- Build the capacity of libraries and archives to lead and contribute to efforts that improve community well-being and strengthen civic engagement
- Objectives:
- Develop or enhance replicable programming, models, and tools that engage communities and individuals of diverse cultural and socioeconomic backgrounds. Topics may include, but are not limited to, workforce and economic development; financial, health, social, or legal services; or efforts that increase equity and access
- Objective: Develop or enhance collaborations between libraries and stakeholders to address community needs. Partners may include, but are not limited to, museums, school systems, service organizations, workforce or community development groups, government agencies, departments of correction, community colleges, and community associations
- Objective: Establish or refine approaches that equip libraries and archives to contribute to the well-being of communities. Approaches may include, but are not limited to, asset mapping, public data mining, social network analysis, journey mapping, and generating impact indicators in collaboration with the community to better understand social and economic conditions, infrastructure challenges, and geographic or cultural barriers
- Improve the ability of libraries and archives to provide broad access to and use of information and collections with emphasis on collaboration to avoid duplication and maximize reach
- Objectives:
- Advance digital inclusion, broadly defined. Approaches may include, but are not limited to, enhancing digital infrastructures, platforms, technologies, online services, connectivity, digital literacy, privacy, and security, as well as creating new processes and procedures needed to sustain a robust online environment
- Support innovative approaches to digital collection management. These may include, but are not limited to, preservation and access to information and resources through retrospective and born-digital content; digital preservation strategies; community archives; web archiving; and improving cataloging and inventory practices
- Support the design and development of online library and archives services that meet user expectations for operating in an online environment
- Strengthen the ability of libraries to provide services to affected communities in the event of an emergency or disaster
- Objectives:
- Support the development of model emergency and disaster management plans. This may take the form of employing new and emerging technologies, where appropriate, and the widespread dissemination of information derived from them
- Support the implementation of such emergency and disaster management plans. This may include, but not be limited to, enabling libraries to provide appropriate services to affected communities in the event of emergencies or disasters
- Strengthen the ability of libraries, archives, and museums to work collaboratively for the benefit of the communities they serve
- Objectives:
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- Support the development of replicable systems that leverage institutional expertise and experience to maximize public access to and use of knowledge resources. Issues addressed may include, but are not limited to, practicing effective communication and conflict resolution, sharing decision-making, recognizing and accommodating different values, building a collective set of goals, establishing shared vocabularies and common practices, formalizing workflow processes or protocols, establishing guidelines and standards, building broad infrastructures, creating or customizing project technology, and cross-training staff and volunteers
- Support joint projects designed to address a shared problem and structured to use the expertise, experience, and perspective of each partner institution in its solution. Collaborating partners should include at least one museum, broadly defined. Projects may address, but are not limited to, innovative programming; literacy skill-building; object- and primary source-based learning through exhibitions and programs; curriculum development; collections management, care, and conservation; enhancing online discoverability; and improving online user experience.
Project Types
The National Leadership Grants for Libraries Program has four project types, and applicants must designate one of them for each application they submit. Applicants may submit more than one application to the National Leadership Grants for Libraries Program; however, they may not submit the same proposal under more than one project type.
The project types and corresponding periods of performance are:
- Planning projects support exploratory activities, such as analyzing needs and feasibility; solidifying partnerships; developing project work plans; or developing prototypes, proofs of concept, and pilot studies. Applications should identify planning activities that have the potential to lead to future implementation. The period of performance for a Planning project is one to two years
- Forum projects support convening qualified experts and key stakeholders, including those from adjacent fields as appropriate, to help explore current or emerging issues or opportunities that are important to libraries and archives across the nation. Reports and other deliverables should be prepared for wide dissemination. Convenings should leverage technology, such as virtual meetings or live streaming, to allow broad participation. Additional mechanisms for engaging stakeholders and building awareness of the findings are encouraged. The period of performance for a Forum project is one to two years
- Implementation projects support the development, execution, and evaluation of work that transforms how libraries and archives serve the nation. Implementation projects may develop new tools and resources or expand existing products or services for new audiences or in new contexts. Applicants should design their proposed work to ensure that new practices have the potential to be easily adoptable, sustainable, and widely implementable across the field. The period of performance for an Implementation project is one to three years
- Applied Research projects support the investigation of key questions relevant to library or archival tools and services, building on prior empirical, theoretical, or exploratory work in libraries and archives or other relevant disciplines. Applicants must include clearly articulated research questions and feature appropriate methods, including relevant theoretical or conceptual approaches, data collection, and analysis. Findings and their implications for library and archival practice should be shared broadly throughout the grant period of performance, rather than exclusively at the end of the project. Dissemination activities should extend beyond publishing journal articles and presenting at academic conferences. Research projects should not be designed with a deterministic agenda or predetermined outcomes. Proposals focused on evaluation are not appropriate for the Applied Research project type and should be submitted under the Implementation project type above. The period of performance for an Applied Research project is one to three years.
Funding Information
- Total amount of funding IMLS expects to award through this announcement: $11,500,000
- Planning: $50,000 – $150,000
- Period of Performance: 1 to 2 years
- Forum: $50,000 – $150,000
- Period of Performance: 1 to 2 years
- Implementation: $50,000 – $1,000,000
- Period of Performance: 1 to 3 years
- Applied Research: $50,000 – $750,000
- Period of Performance: 1 to 3 years
Eligibility Criteria
- To be eligible for an award under the National Leadership Grants for Libraries Program, you must:
- be either a unit of State, local, or tribal government or be a private, nonprofit organization that has nonprofit status under the Internal Revenue Code of 1954, as amended, and
- be located in one of the 50 States of the United States of America, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, the Federated States of Micronesia, or the Republic of Palau
- In addition, you must qualify as one of the following six types of organizations:
- A library or a parent organization, such as a school district, a municipality, a State agency, or an academic institution, that is responsible for the administration of a library. Eligible libraries include:
- Public libraries
- Public elementary and secondary school libraries
- Tribal libraries
- College (including community college) and university libraries
- Research libraries and archives that are not an integral part of an institution of higher education and that make publicly available library services and materials that are suitable for scholarly research and are not otherwise available
- Private or other special library, but only if the State in which such private or special library is located determines that the library should be considered a library for purposes of Library Services and Technology
- Archives, including institutional, community-based, and special collections, that are under the supervision of at least one permanent professional staff member and are available to the public.
- An academic or administrative unit, such as a graduate school of library and information science that is part of an institution of higher education through which it would apply;
- A digital library or archives, if it makes materials publicly available and provides library or archival services, including selection, organization, description, reference, and preservation, under the supervision of at least one permanent professional staff librarian/archivist;
- A library or archival agency that is an official agency of a State, tribal, or other unit of government and is charged by the law governing it with the extension and development of public library services within its jurisdiction;
- A library or archives consortium that is a local, statewide, regional, interstate, or international cooperative association of library entities that provides for the systematic and effective coordination of the resources of eligible libraries or archives, as defined above, and information centers that work to improve the services delivered to the clientele of these libraries or archives; or
- A library or archives association that exists on a permanent basis; serves libraries, archives, or library or archival professionals on a national, regional, State, or local level; and engages in activities designed to advance the well-being of libraries and the library profession.
- A library or a parent organization, such as a school district, a municipality, a State agency, or an academic institution, that is responsible for the administration of a library. Eligible libraries include:
For more information, visit Grants.gov.