 Welcome to Leverage Libraries to Achieve Historic Progress Towards Digital Equity for All. I'm Kara Malinfant with ACAL, a division of the American Library Association, joined by broadband consultant for ALA Michelle Frisk. Building on pandemic relief and recovery programs, the federal government is making historic investments through the Infrastructure Investment and Job Act, IIJA, in advancing digital equity, literacy, and inclusion for all. The IIJA highlights the important role that community anchor institutions like libraries play in creating a digitally equitable future for all. Libraries of all types, including academic and research libraries, will be eligible for some of the funding opportunities. In today's session, we'll talk about how this will benefit your library, the federal funding opportunities that are available, how academic and research libraries are supporting digital equity, literacy, and inclusion, how you can prepare for the opportunity, and we'll be introducing the report, Leverage Libraries to Achieve Digital Equity for All, and some next steps. One of the programs in the IIJA is the Digital Equity Act, which provides $2.7 billion over five years to promote digital equity, literacy, and inclusion initiatives at the state, local, and national levels. This is an unprecedented level of funding to advance digital equity, and libraries of all types will be eligible to apply. There is unlikely to be another opportunity like this in our lifetime to further the good work libraries of all types are already doing. In short, funding will be distributed in three streams, which we'll explore more in depth later, but here is a high-level overview. It starts with $60 million in planning grants to states and territories so they can develop digital equity plans with stakeholders input. This is happening right now. There's $1.44 billion in state capacity grants to achieve the goals identified during the planning phase. States will have five years to implement their digital equity plans. There will also be an additional $1.25 billion in a competitive grant program, which will be administered at the federal level annually for four years. The great news is that funding is available to support work that community colleges, colleges, and university libraries are already doing, including training programs that cover basic and advanced digital skills, including information literacy, workforce development programs for student workers, residencies, community support of workforce development, and more. Free or low-cost equipment provided to covered populations and constructing, upgrading, or expanding public access computing centers. It also strongly encourages community collaboration. The Digital Equity Act promotes digital inclusion and to spur greater adoption of broadband among covered populations and communities who have been disproportionately impacted by digital inequity. Many of these populations are key groups of students and community members. Your library or campus is already serving. These populations include households that have an income of less than 150% of the poverty level, individuals with language barriers, members of racial or ethnic minority groups, individuals with disabilities, those that reside in rural areas, veterans, incarcerated individuals, and those that are 80 and above. So what federal funding opportunities are available? The Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act has three goals. They are to build infrastructure that provides reliable, high-speed internet access to all Americans for today and tomorrow. It's to make high-speed internet affordable and reliable so everyone can participate, and it provides the resources needed to equitably expand the adoption and use of the internet so everyone can experience the benefits. The Digital Equity Act is one the libraries of all types will benefit from most. It will be administered by the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, also known or referred to as the NTIA. It includes three funding streams. The first funding stream includes $60 million for state digital equity planning grants, which requires states to develop a digital equity plan. States have designated an entity, often but not always the state broadband office, to receive the funds and develop the plan. The designated administering entity has one year to gather input and develop the plan to promote digital equity, support digital inclusion activities, and build capacity for broadband adoption for state residents. Both states receive their funds late fall, so the clock is ticking. Plans must be submitted to the NTIA for approval. States are using their planning funds to develop their digital equity plans for the next five years. This plan must include how the state will build broadband infrastructure that is affordable, reliable, and high-speed, how they're going to facilitate the adoption of high-speed internet in unserved and underserved communities, how they're going to implement and support digital skills training, including information literacy and workforce development, and make equipment software and support for high-speed internet service available. Each state must engage committee partners in its plan, including libraries to achieve its digital equity goals. Once the digital equity plans are approved by the NTIA, states will then receive federal funds to implement their plans. So this is the time for you to take action. You can find out what is happening at your state. Ask your state librarian or your state library association how your state is developing its digital equity plan. Is it the state broadband office who's responsible? Is it some other entity? And how can community partners get involved? Then you can become a leader at your institution. Talk to campus partners who are already working with students from covered populations like TRIO, student services, tutoring, the Writing Center, disability services. Find out what kind of workforce development your career services or other offices are offering that help covered populations find jobs or change careers. Is there an entrepreneurship center that helps community members start a new business? You can represent your institution, your students, and your community to state planners, but you really do need to showcase your work. Now is the time to tell those state planners how your library advances digital equity. Connect the dots for them. If your library lends laptops or Wi-Fi hotspots, that improves digital equity. If you're open to the public, if you have a learning commons, computing equipment, a digital innovation lab that anyone can use, that is equipment, software, and support that advances digital equity. If you offer technology training, that also supports digital equity. So we see great opportunities for academic libraries. There's lots you're doing that's training and workforce development, but you need to tell state planners. Talk to them about your information literacy instruction, your citation management workshops, your research consultations. That's digital skills training. And it could qualify for funding in the future if it reaches covered and underserved populations. If you are employing student workers, I know y'all are. Libraries are one of the biggest employers on campus. And if those student workers are being highly trained to be peer research coaches and to use all the affordances of the digital world, then that training that you're offering, that's workforce development. That's experiential learning. And again, if your employees are from covered populations, that could qualify in the future. So you need to let these state planners know that with funds, libraries are well positioned to offer even more workforce development, even more training that you could scale up internships, practicums for students. You could start to offer fellowships or residencies for new LIS graduates. You can tell a convincing story about how the experiential learning you offer in the workplace imparts the digital competencies that help launch people in their careers. Describe how if you had funds through your state, you could involve more people from covered populations in areas where libraries already have expertise. If you're looking for more ways in which you can amplify your assets and connect your work to community partners, check out this guide for strategies you can use to promote the role your library can play in advancing your state's digital equity plan. Now we look through past CNI project briefings for a few examples of things that could be the kinds of things state planners would be very, very interested in knowing about. We can't say 100% for sure that this would qualify as a digital equity funded project in the future, but they're the kinds of things you could showcase. So first, Digital Borderlands Initiative at the University of Arizona Libraries is exploring strategies for integrating a broad range of library services into the research enterprise. It supports data intensive humanities scholarship, and that's data literacy digital literacy focused on the US Mexico borderlands with open access for research outputs. A central component is community engagement. With the focus on storytelling, not just to specialists but the general public, it advances the university's priorities as Hispanic serving institution and makes projects widely available to the broader communities so that gets at the covered populations aspect. The digital scholarship services at the University of Michigan started as a grassroots effort among librarians and it consultants with minimal resources and has come into comprehensive pilot program that offers consultations workshops at public events that's digital literacy training. And this collaborative model has helped to cohere a community for digital scholarship practitioners at a large distributed campus, potentially that could reach covered populations. Lastly, building resilience to health misinformation in local communities. This is a public and academic library partnership in San Diego County. The San Diego circuit consortium of public and academic library libraries aims to develop health information literacy and health misinformation resilience in the regional community. Share examples like these when you go talk to your state planners, help them see that these are the kinds of projects libraries are already doing they may not be thinking about how these projects could be modified, expanded, transferred from one setting to another, and that really these are supporting exactly the digital equity goals of the state. They likely don't know that academic libraries are doing this type of digital equity work and should be included in the planning phase. Once the digital equity plan is completed there is $1.44 billion available to implement the state digital equity capacity grant program. The money will be distributed to each state and territory based on formulas once their digital equity plan is approved by the NTIA states will have five years to implement their digital equity plans. In addition to the state digital equity capacity grant program, which is administered by each state. There is also the digital equity competitive grant program at the national level. This 1.25 billion program is for eligible entities, including libraries to promote digital inclusion and spur greater broadband adoption among covered populations. It also strongly encourages community collaboration. Like the state grant it supports training programs that cover basic and advanced digital skills workforce development programs for your low cost equipment provided to covered populations and constructing upgrading or expanding public access computer centers. The competitive grant program will be administered at the federal level by the NTIA. A notice of funding opportunity, which will include details and how the program will work won't be issued for quite some time. We're thinking maybe late 2024 but could be 2025. ALA will share more information about this program with its members as more information becomes available. In addition to the digital equity act there is also the feed program, which includes $42.5 billion to expand high speed broadband access infrastructure deployment and adoption. Like the DEA states will first receive funds to develop their five year action plan and build capacity to support their efforts. The federal communications commission also known as the FCC is currently updating its broadband availability maps. Based on those maps delineating unserved and underserved areas states will be informed of the amount they will receive to support their broadband initiatives. States will then submit plans to achieve their broadband goals with a priority on providing broadband access. The speed plans must also align with the state's digital equity plan. This funding will be under connected and unconnected households in your area could have access to the internet in the future if they don't have it now. What feeds goal is to build infrastructure that provides reliable high speed affordable internet access to all Americans for today and tomorrow. As part of the I I j a there is also the goal of ensuring residents, especially those covered populations have the necessary skills and understand the benefits of having access to and using the internet in their daily lives. They strongly encourages collaboration with community organizations like libraries to ensure these newly connected communities can build the digital skills they need to benefit from this new access. The states DEA and be plans while separate must complement each other. There are multiple funding opportunities to support and advance digital equity. Some funding sources are new. Some existed before the infrastructure investment and jobs act, and some are still under discussion. As part of the a la report, leverage libraries to achieve historic progress towards digital equity for all toolkit. There is a resource that lists additional funding opportunities available to support digital equity. Let's highlight a few. Through its various grant programs the Institute of Museum and library services or I am less has funded many programs supporting and advancing digital equity, including supporting a digital navigator program. Listed below or grants that have been used to fund digital equity projects for a complete list of grants available. See the grants program page for the I am less website. The national leadership grant for libraries program supports projects that address the critical needs of the library and archives field. The results of this program are new models new tools research findings services practices or alliances that can widely be used adopted or scaled, or replicated to extend the leverage and the benefits of the federal investment. A recent award from the national leadership grants for libraries program is being used to address digital equity in equities in rural or agricultural communities, specifically for migrant and seasonal farm workers. A recent Laura Bush 21st century librarian program award was used to create the toolkit toward a gigabyte libraries, which is a tool libraries can use to address the digital infrastructure. With the digital equity act libraries will need to help build their libraries digital literacy skills. This means libraries need a workforce that can support the community's needs. This grant may be one way libraries can explore how to build staff skills that support the community's needs up today, while preparing staff so they continue to support their communities needs of the future. The US Department of Education has the gear up program, which was created to support and increase the number of low income students who are prepared to enter and succeed in post secondary education. The grant, while not specific to libraries requires collaboration. There are past award winners that include collaborations between college libraries and high school libraries to build the digital skills of incoming students. Check the gear up website for eligibility requirements. So what can you do to prepare for some of these opportunities. There are lots of them as you've seen it's not just about the digital equity act there's also I am less gear up than others. Beed, but right now is the time to take action for the digital equity act state planning. Again states and territories are developing those plans right now and these plans, once approved, are going to identify how each state will be allocated. So states have been given an aggressive timetable to create these plans, and they must include community engagement that means you you're the community. So community college college and research libraries need to start advocating on their behalf and on behalf of their students and their communities to make sure that they're seen as essential community collaborators, and that you can help the state successfully implemented their digital equity plans. To amplify the digital equity literacy and inclusion work happening in libraries across the nation, including college and research libraries, al a release the report, leverage libraries to achieve historic progress towards digital equity for all. This is just one of the many ways al a advocates with and for libraries to ensure their eligibility and inclusion in federal state and local programs. al a will continue to share policy information best practices, funding opportunities and a range of resources from libraries and partner organizations to support your digital equity work. The report and future updates can be found following the link you see on the screen. We also encourage you to share your stories with us so we can continue to promote and share the contributions libraries are making to advance digital equity in their community. Thank you so much.