Public library digital participation programmes – the impact on #employability #infolit

There is a blog post summarising results from a project funded by the CILIP Information Literacy Group (with additional financial support from the Scottish Government): Public library digital participation programmes – the impact on employability. The post is by Lindsay McKrell, Team Leader for Libraries and Archives, Stirling Council, and Angela Short, Digital Inclusion Officer. "Work IT is a flexible programme of digital support for employability offered by libraries in libraries, established in response to increased demand for job-related IT assistance ... It was felt a dedicated Digital Inclusion Officer could offer effective digital support to jobseekers, enhance skills and build confidence in a local library setting. We applied for funding for an action research programme to investigate this and were awarded a bursary from the Information Literacy Group of CILIP funding a Digital Inclusion Officer for 4 months. Scottish Government Digital Participation Unit funding allowed us to extend the research period by a further 10 months and the research programme ran from September 2017 – November 2018. Through partnership working and 1-2-1 support the Officer engaged with a large number of jobseekers, 32 of whom attended four or more times and agreed to participate in the research. Findings showed participants gained new skills and confidence and after attending the percentage using the internet to find information rose from 22% to 54%."
Go to https://infolit.org.uk/ilg-funded-project-public-library-digital-participation-programmes-the-impact-on-employability/ for the blog post and the report is at https://infolit.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Work-IT-FINAL-Report-201218.pdf
Photo by Sheila Webber: West Port Gardens, Edinburgh, March 2019