By Josette Keelor
Libraries are identified for the free providers they supply communities — from books, magazinesand different media to applications like lessons, workshops and youngsters’s applications. When mixed with different taking part organizations, libraries can present almost limitless assets that assist group members obtain success.
Dr. Mary McKay sees libraries as a possibility to put social employees with a full vary of abilities in proximity to communities in want of social providers.
“A library is a public good for all,” stated McKay, an NASW member, vice provost of Interdisciplinary Initiatives on the College of Illinois at Chicago, and president of the American Academy of Social Work and Social Welfare.Libraries provide such a conducive location as a result of they serve people in addition to weak teams in a spot that’s accessible and fewer stigmatizing.
Libraries and social employees are “only a great match,” stated Will Francis, LMSW, government director of the NASW’s Texas and Louisiana chapters. “You need to discover areas in the neighborhood the place folks already go.”
Libraries are protected, free areas the place folks of any age, financial state of affairs or instructional degree can take part.Ideally, Francis stated, social providers wouldn’t be robust to search out or tough to entry. Library social work is about “assembly the shopper the place they already are.”
Libraries are serving to social employees in that effort by means of analysis, group connections, partnerships with college applications, and entry to grants.In relation to connecting folks to wanted providers, “there’s plenty of collaboration that occurs,” stated Alicia Melnick, an LCSW with the College of Pittsburgh College of Social Work and a member of NASW. “We actually see the libraries taking on as group facilities and group hubs in plenty of these communities.”
Learn the complete function story within the NASW Social Work Advocates journal here.
