{"id":10908,"date":"2020-11-30T12:12:58","date_gmt":"2020-11-30T20:12:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/bclaconnectrev.wpengine.com\/perspectives\/?p=10908"},"modified":"2025-01-22T11:25:31","modified_gmt":"2025-01-22T19:25:31","slug":"write-to-read-project","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/bclaconnect.ca\/perspectives\/2020\/11\/30\/write-to-read-project\/","title":{"rendered":"The Write to Read Project: Moving Towards Cohesion, Collaboration and Exploring the Decolonization of Libraries"},"content":{"rendered":"

Brief Background<\/strong><\/p>\n

The <\/span>Write To Read Project<\/span><\/a> (W2R) began in 2009 when the Hon. Steven Point was BC\u2019s 28<\/span>th<\/span> Lieutenant Governor and Robert Blacker, a recipient of the Meritorious Service Medal, was his honorary aide-de-camp at the same time that he was the district governor for Rotary International District 5040, the district that covers much of British Columbia.\u00a0 The project started with a conversation between the two of them about Rotary\u2019s area of focus on education and basic literacy.\u00a0 Out of that conversation emerged the momentum and the action to collaborate with First Nations and Indigenous communities in rural, northern and underserved communities, to establish library learning centres located right in those communities, and operated by local residents.\u00a0 As the name of the project implies, literacy and education with Indigenous culture, traditions and knowledge as foundation pieces, are essential achievements in measuring success and building literacy equity.<\/span><\/p>\n

The highly effective network of Rotary International\u2019s clubs\u00a0 around the province and beyond has been a channel for advocacy and support.\u00a0 In addition to District 5040, District 5050 (Hope to Everett, Washington) Districts 5020 (Vancouver Island and western Washington State) and 5060 (Okanagan and central Washington) and others have contributed.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/span>Working in collaboration with interested First Nations elders, leaders and communities, and with the support of the Government House Foundation and corporate sponsors, planning, funding and dialogue resulted in the building of numerous libraries and learning centres\u2014twenty since 2011.\u00a0 All have been installed or built and supplied with books, materials, technology and informal training for staff and volunteers.\u00a0 Much of this has been achieved with volunteer contributions from hundreds of people and numerous organizations, and volunteerism remains a hallmark of the W2R effort.<\/span><\/p>\n

Collection development is a collaborative effort with each W2R library, but processing and classification, both for opening days in new locations and for scheduled collection updates, are centralized in the Lower Mainland.\u00a0 This processing work is undertaken by a group called the Library Response Team, some of whom are retired librarians.\u00a0 With the growth in Indigenous publishing over the past decade, the materials going into W2R communities are highly representative of First Nations, Metis and Inuit stories and cultural traditions.\u00a0 The project is honoured to have <\/span>Goodminds.com<\/span><\/a> as a sponsor, with its ongoing commitment to donate books and e-resources that are either Indigenous authored or have Indigenous content, to W2R libraries and learning centres.<\/span><\/p>\n

Evolution: From Libraries to Learning Centres and Community Development<\/strong><\/p>\n

The evolution from libraries that mainly circulated books to more multi-faceted learning centres began with the twelfth W2R community partnership in Nooaitch[1]<\/a>,<\/span>\u00a0west and north of Merritt.\u00a0 There, Band members requested video conferencing capability.\u00a0 That broadened the scope of programs to include adult learning online.\u00a0 This theme and technology component took hold and has been incorporated into the nine centres opened since.\u00a0 In a number of communities, the arrival of a W2R learning centre has also meant the first viable access to computers and the Internet for that area.\u00a0 While most BC residents take having a smart digital device and stable Internet connectivity for granted, these still aren\u2019t available in some rural and remote locations.\u00a0\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In the case of the Tl\u2019esqox First Nation[2]<\/a><\/span>, located 50 km west of Williams Lake, the W2R centre was part of a larger renovation project that turned the building it is attached to into a multi-generational centre. This centre includes early learning, youth and Elders programs as well as a recording studio for language and culture revitalization. This studio was made possible through a joint grant with the Rotary Club of Yarmouth, Maine. It enabled the Tsilhqot\u2019in National Government to connect their radio station that broadcasts locally, and it is a resource for language learning and building of technology and broadcast skills for some community members.<\/span><\/p>\n\n\t\t