Uptown Children's Library Breaking Ground This Spring

This is a rendering of the Uptown Lofts that will be built on the corner of 61st St. and 22nd Ave. (across the alley from Family Dollar.) The top 3 floors are affordable housing units. The first floor is retail. The end section with the sign Corner Cafe is the site we are looking at to create a new children's library for the neighborhood. It's about 5,800 sq. ft. (The current Uptown Library entire 1st floor is 2,274 sq. ft.) The unit next door is probably going to be a small Mexican restaurant and on the other side of that is the grocery store the neighborhood has asked for. That store will be just under 11,000 sq. ft. There is underground parking on our side , a parking lot on the side and in the back. The side facing the alley won't be windows as shown. 

The project will break ground in spring. The city will purchase our space and we will need to staff it. The city has allotted $450,000 to complete the interior. We'll be doing a lot of fundraising to enhance that budget. I'll share more as I know more.

Next month we'll be offering Public Services staff trauma informed training with Professor Debra Kelly from Carthage College. This training will increase our confidence when interacting with people affected by trauma. Look for training dates and locations soon.

We're also partnering with 10 other libraries in the 11 member City Library Collective on a Whole Person Librarianship training program for staff. Sara Zettervall, the librarian who wrote Whole Person Librarianship, will be our trainer. We'll work in groups with similar libraries to understand how we can better serve people needing social services. We'll offer that training sometime between March and June. Oshkosh local television did a quick video interview about the project. Take a look.

Congratulations to Shawn and Erin who were accepted to give two presentations for this year's UW Whitewater Early Childhood Education Conference! The conference is virtual again and they will be recording their presentations in advance.
The presentations that were selected are:
1) Diversity: More Than Just Holidays (This will focus on diverse books.)
2) Having Fun with STEM and Early Literacy

Our latest Bright Spot nominations both come from Karen:
"I'd like to nominate Alejandria for a Bright Spot Award. Last Friday afternoon, she gave up everything she needed to do and started bagging up masks. Circ was already out of masks and she tirelessly just kept working until after 6pm. "

"I'd like to nominate Aaron Gunderson for a Bright Spot award. I was unable to make a couple large color copies. Aaron went out of his way to find out exactly what I needed and made it easy for me to finish the project. Thank you, Aaron!!"