June 2023: Digital Inclusion Training for Facilitators, New Open Courses, and More!

Hi, friends of P2PU! We’re hosting a training for facilitators focused on digital inclusion on July 19th! (RSVP) This event is for anyone interested in facilitating learning circles focused on digital literacy, financial literacy, and other important skills in their communities. We’ve also been working on:

Leading sustainability-focused initiatives with facilitators in Denmark Adding new communication features to the learner dashboard  Adapting open courses focused on entrepreneurship And so much more!

Have any feedback? Drop us a line at thepeople@p2pu.org – we’re always glad to hear from you.

The P2PU Team

Facilitator Training for Digital Inclusion on July 19!

Back in April, we hosted a community call on Digital Inclusion to learn more about your communities’ needs and co-design new facilitator guides.

We’re proud to share the following four new facilitator guides focused on digital inclusion, and we’re grateful to the Alliant Credit Union Foundation for supporting this project:

 Introductory Computer Skills  Personal Financial Planning  Creating a Personal Website Using WordPress  Excel Basics for Data Analysis

  Interested in facilitating these learning circles in your community? Join our facilitator training on July 19 to learn some best practices for facilitation, ask questions, and meet other facilitators! 

Coming Soon: A New Open Course for Aspiring Entrepreneurs!

We’re excited to announce our collaboration with the NYU Tandon Future Labs on an open course for new founders!

We’ve used Course-in-a-Box to adapt Keystone, Future Labs’ virtual crash course for early-stage founders and aspiring entrepreneurs with technology-enabled ventures. This open course emphasizes group activities, opportunities for reflection, and peer collaboration. Participants will leave the learning circle with a deeper grasp of key entrepreneurial concepts, an elevator pitch, and a completed executive summary of their company’s strategy.

Keep an eye out for the course rollout happening later this summer at our partner libraries, as well as our future facilitator trainings! We can’t wait to share this with you. 

Facilitator Spotlight: Noor Sabahi at the Carnegie Public Library of Pittsburgh!

This spring, Noor Sabahi facilitated a learning circle on Cloud Computing (AWS) at the Carnegie Public Library of Pittsburgh. Noor created her own slide presentation to accompany a Udemy course accessible through CPL’s subscription. In their survey responses, her learning circle’s participants were enthusiastic about pursuing more education, training, and certification in this area, and they appreciated Noor’s background knowledge and her commitment to tailoring assignments to students’ goals.

We loved meeting Noor at our facilitator calls earlier this year, and we’re so glad we got to answer her insightful questions and get her tips (including her dedication to snack breaks!). Join our next facilitator call on July 5th (RSVP!) to get support, share your experiences, and meet other facilitators!

We are so grateful to the Carnegie Public Library of Pittsburgh for being an active part of our Teams membership program, and we look forward to continuing to support their learning circle initiative, We Learn. Learn more about how to start your own Team, and visit our Knowledge Base to learn about additional support and tools for Teams members!

Facilitation and Fermentation at Next Library

Back in May, P2PU’s own Grif Peterson and Aarhus Public Librarian Astrid Richter Johanssen presented at the Next Library conference!

Grif and Astrid hosted a workshop on Facilitation and Fermentation where learners made kombucha, and they discussed how library staff around the world can facilitate collaborative experiences, build collective knowledge, and improve our own footprints on the world.

This workshop is an extension of Dokk1 and P2PU’s collaborative project “Læringsfællesskaber for en bæredygtig fremtid” (Learning circles for a sustainable future), designed to connect hands-on, creative learning workshops in the library with the United Nation Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

We’re working with Dokk1 to create a custom site for the Aarhus Public Libraries to help facilitators organize SDG-focused learning circles, and we’re excited to keep working with Danish facilitators to develop workshops that connect learners to their local libraries, ecologies, and communities. 

Interested in collaborating on a custom site for learning circles in your community? Ask thepeople@p2pu.org!

Facilitator Spotlight: Hellen at Mbale Public Library!

In March, we introduced a brand-new custom website for Ugandan learners to sign up for learning circles and find learning resources developed by and for Ugandan facilitators. The P2PU team also developed four new facilitator guides on jewelry-making, entrepreneurship, paper bag-making, and mobile digital literacy.

Hellen Ossaba facilitated a learning circle at the Mbale Public Library on Jewelry-Making, and over 25 participants learned how to make beads using paper that they used to make necklaces, bracelets, and other wearable pieces.  

Hellen says: “Thank you, P2PU – I am very grateful that as a librarian, I am able to help the people in my community to learn new skills for economic empowerment.”

We’re grateful to our partnerships with the National Library of Uganda, the Maendeleo Foundation, the EIFL Public Library Innovation Programme, and Enabel that made this work possible!

New Dashboard Features for Learners!

We’ve been hard at work building a dashboard for learners. By creating a P2PU account, learners can access information about their current and past learning circles, engage with their facilitators, manage RSVPs to individual sessions, and submit their feedback – all in one place.

The dashboard is the first step in improving our tools for learners. We’d like to improve the learning circle experience while ensuring that learners get the support they need to document what they learn and pursue the learning outcomes they desire. We’d love to hear your questions, feedback and suggestions? Let us know at thepeople@p2pu.org!

Learn More about our Learning Circle Software!

Designing Learning Circles to Support Economic Mobility

We have spent the past few months listening and learning to inform future program opportunities, and we’re continuing to share our findings as we explore and design new programs to help learners meet their career goals and improve economic opportunity! Our first and second blog posts covered our initial findings and the trends from our conversations with learners and librarians across the country.

We’re excited to share the third blog post in this series! We’ve identified seven major areas of potential impact to explore further that include career-focused digital skills development, information literacy in the age of AI, and supporting libraries’ efforts to enhance lifelong learning. Read on to learn more about our process for identifying ideas most aligned with our community and values!

Upcoming Events

Wed, July 19 Facilitator Training: Digital Inclusion (RSVP + Info) Join our facilitator training on July 19 to learn some best practices for facilitation, ask questions, and meet other facilitators! Share this event with anyone interested in facilitating learning circles focused on digital literacy, financial literacy, Excel proficiency, and other important skills.

Wed, July 5  |  Wed, Aug 2 Monthly Facilitator Call (RSVP + Info) Our monthly facilitator call is a space for current facilitators to reflect on practices and get support. Come meet facilitators in our community and get help from our team on the first Wednesday of every month! 

Subscribe to add P2PU Community Calendar events to your personal calendar!