In partnership with the Indian Trails Public Library District, the University of Illinois was awarded $100,000 to develop an initial framework and future toolkit for measuring the impact and value of public library makerspaces in the lives of users and the communities that libraries serve. As public libraries have evolved to meet the lifelong learning needs of the community, traditional library measurements and statistics do not accurately reflect the full economic, educational and social impact of the services in the community.
U of I Associate Professor and Interim Associate Dean for Academic Affairs Emily Knox and Associate Professor Kyungwon Koh received the grant from the Institute of Museum and Library Services for their project, “Measuring the Impact and Value of Makerspaces in Public Libraries.” Indian Trails Library added a makerspace (The Launch…
