Press Release
May 3, 2021
The American Indian Library Association and the Asian/Pacific American Librarians Association Announce Winners of the 2021 Talk Story Grant The American Indian Library Association (AILA) and the Asian/Pacific American Librarians Association (APALA), supported by Toyota Financial Services, are pleased to award a $750 grant to each of the following four libraries and community organizations to host Talk Story: Sharing Stories, Sharing Culture programming. The awarded libraries and community organizations are:
Cloquet Public Library, Minnesota – Grant funds will create a Story Stroll and provide free books to the community.
PS 64 Q – The Joseph P. Addabbo School, New York – Partnering with the Deshi Senior Center, PS 64 Q – The Joseph P. Addabbo School library seeks to establish an intergenerational “reading buddy” program that intentionally supports students in their proficiency as emerging English-language readers, writers, and speakers. Students will engage in discussion with their Senior buddy about shared experiences and cultural connections, share read-aloud stories, and collaboratively write and illustrate a story together. Talk Story grant funds will be used to purchase bilingual, Bengali-English, books and supplies in support of this program.
Springdale Public Library, Arkansas – Springdale is home to one of the largest Marshallese populations in the contiguous United States. Working with local Marshallese community agencies, the Springdale Public Library will actively seek out and engage elders of the Marshallese Community to share legends and folktales part of the Marshallese oral tradition to contribute to virtual and future in-person Marshallese story time. In addition to supporting program implementation, Talk Story grant funds will also support archiving of co-created Marshallese storytelling content as a special collection within the library.
Window Rock-Fort Defiance Lions Club, Arizona – Grant funds will be used by this virtual book club to engage their community with art, four children’s books, and four chapter books.
Talk Story: Sharing stories, sharing culture is a literacy program that reaches out to Asian and Pacific Islander American (APIA) and American Indian children and their families. The program celebrates and explores their stories through books, oral traditions, and art to provide an interactive, enriching experience. Grants provide financial support to libraries and community organizations who want to introduce a Talk Story program into their library.
Talk Story: Sharing stories, sharing culture is a joint project between the American Indian Library Association (http://ailanet.org) and the Asian Pacific American Librarians Association (www.apalaweb.org). It started as part of ALA 2009-2010 President Camila Alire’s Family Literacy Focus Initiative. 2021 is the eleventh year that AILA and APALA have partnered on the Talk Story project and allocated grant funding to libraries to implement programs geared towards the APIA/American Indian communities. This is the seventh year that Toyota Financial Services has helped to sponsor grants.
Committee Chairs are Angela Thornton (AILA) and Amy Breslin (APALA). For more information, please visit the Talk Story web site: www.talkstorytogether.org