PDA Event: Best Practices in Programming for Adults with Developmental Disabilities

Are you confused about how to serve adults with autism, intellectual or other developmental disabilities who you see in your library?  Or are you wondering why these members of the community are not coming into your library?  We have the answers for you!  In this overview of best practices in programming for adults with developmental disabilities, Barbara Klipper and Carrie Banks will provide both an overall paradigm as well as practical solutions you can adopt to help you better serve these patrons.  

Expect to learn about:

• What constitutes a library culture of inclusion and why that is important
• Universal Design for Learning and how it applies to programming
• How to partner and communicate with members of the disability community and other stakeholders
• What you should consider as you design programs
• Some easy-to-replicate program models 

You’ll leave this webinar with your questions answered, some new tools and strategies, and the inspiration to make some changes in how you approach programming for adults both with and without developmental disabilities. 

After all, libraries are for everyone!

Presenters:

Carrie Banks has been in charge of Brooklyn Public Library’s (BPL) Inclusive Services since 1997 and taught Including Youth with Disabilities at Pratt Institute from 2013 to 2015. Active in ASGCLA and ALSC since 2000, she was president of ASGCLA in 2020.  From 2017 to 2019, she was part of ALA President Loida Garcia-Febo’s EDI Presidential Team.  In 2014, she substantially revised Including Families of Children with Special Needs: A How to Do It Manual for Librarians.  Libraries and Garden: Growing Together, written with Cynthia Mediavilla, was published in the Spring of 2019. Library Programming for Adults with Developmental Disabilities, written with Barbara Klipper, came out in Spring 2021. 

Barbara Klipper is a retired public librarian who has been an ally of and advocate for people with developmental disabilities in libraries since the early 2000s. She is the author of Programming for Children and Teens with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ALA, 2014) and coauthor, with Carrie Banks, of Library Programming for Adults with Developmental Disabilities (ALA, 2021). In 2015, she created the “Autism Welcome Here: Library Programs, Services and More” grant. 

Register to attend.

Sponosored by SEFLIN