The ALA Office for Diversity, Literacy & Outreach Services supports library and information science workers in creating responsible and all-inclusive spaces that serve and represent the entire community. To accomplish this, we decenter power and privilege by facilitating conversations around access and identity as they impact the profession and those we serve. We use a social justice framework to inform library and information science workers' development of resources. We strive to create an association culture where these concerns are incorporated into everybody's everyday work. There are three frameworks that ground the work in the ALA Office for Diversity, Literacy and Outreach Services:

1. Diversity - To create an understanding and appreciation for cultural and social differences.

2. Cultural Competency - Effectively interacting with people of different backgrounds and cultures.

3. Social Justice - Focus on power dynamics among different groups of people while acknowledging historical and institutional inequities

As the world's largest library event, the ALA Annual Conference & Exhibition brings together thousands of librarians and library staff, educators, authors, publishers, friends of libraries, trustees, special guests, and exhibitors. ALA Annual offers educational programming; important announcements and updates; relevant legislation and policies; and discussions that majorly impact libraries, their roles, and their ongoing transformation. ODLOS is participating in over 30 events, including educational sessions, meetings with library leaders, and discussion of current library events and policies. We would love to have you join us for our sessions! Check out our schedule and register for ALA Annual below. For those who cannot attend the Annual Conference in person, there is a digital experience available as well.

The revised 1992 Library Standards for Adult Correctional Institutions will be published by ALA in 2023 and made available to as many stakeholders, including incarcerated library users, as possible. We welcome the feedback from all readers of this document and are hopeful that the final result will reflect current and emerging best practices for library services for users who are incarcerated or detained in the US and its territories. The new Standards will heed the current phenomenon of mass incarceration, the inequitable incarceration rates of BIPOC individuals, and the rising rates of incarceration of women (especially women of color) and pay special attention to the incarceration of LGBTQIA+ individuals, undocumented individuals, and youth in jails, prisons, and other detention facilities, as well as to the information needs of returning individuals.

ODLOS partners with member groups to create outreach toolkits that target an underserved population. Digital copies are free for download, and print copies may be requested at any time. Additionally, ALA, in partnership with groups and affiliates has created inclusive booklists to highlight diverse voices including racial diversity and orientation and can be used in the classroom and when ordering collections.

In 2019, just 5.3 percent of librarians identified as Black or African American, 7.1 percent as Hispanic or Latino, and 3.5 percent as Asian-American or Pacific Islander. Over 83 percent of librarians were White, non-Hispanic in 2019. Through the Spectrum Scholarship Program, the American Library Association advances racial equity by connecting new generations of racially and ethnically diverse librarians with a network committed to mutual support, advancing one another's leadership, and making social justice part of everybody's everyday work. The Spectrum Scholarship Program actively recruits and provides scholarships to American Indian/Alaska Native, Asian, Black/African American, Hispanic/Latino, Middle Eastern and North African, and/or Native Hawaiian/Other Pacific Islander students. We acknowledge the multifaceted identities of our Scholars, and the ways that race and ethnicity uniquely intersect with gender, sexuality, class, religion, immigration and citizenship status, (dis)ability, and more. We acknowledge that there are many communities we serve through Spectrum, and that our Scholars experience the colonization and white supremacy culture of library and information science in different ways. For example, the racism faced by Black Scholars is unique from racism experienced by Pacific Islander Scholars and each is different from the marginalization faced by White or White-passing Hispanic/Latino/a/x Scholars.

CSKBART honors the legacy of Mrs. Coretta Scott King by promoting distinguished literature by African American authors and illustrators that depicts the Black experience.

The Rainbow Round Table promotes the development, advancement, and improvement of library services and resources for LGBTQ+ individuals and their communities.

EMIERT provides a forum for the exchange of information on library materials and resources in English and other languages, and promotes service for all ethnolinguistic and multicultural communities in general.

The SRRT works to make ALA more democratic and to establish progressive priorities. It empowers libraries and library workers to recognize and help solve social problems and inequities.

The American Prison Writing Archive (APWA) is a growing digital archive of non-fiction essays by incarcerated writers offering testimony to their experiences of confinement and the criminal legal system. Our goal is to help center the voices of people who have experienced incarceration in national conversations about criminal justice and prison, and to preserve these witness testimonies for future readers. You can explore the APWA at prisonwitness.org.

The APWA has secured a grant from the Mellon Foundation to expand our outreach and representation within the Archive. Although our author and essay representation currently range broadly in location, background, and experience, we're seeking to grow our representation of several groups which are currently underrepresented in the APWA. These include:

Women

People who are trans or gender non-conforming

Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders

Native Americans

Spanish-speaking people

People confined in jails

People confined in immigration detention centers

People aged 70 or older and 18-25

People located in the Plains and Gulf regions, Puerto Rico, Hawaii, Iowa, New Mexico, D.C., New England

A larger representation of varying perspectives from system impacted individuals is essential to grounding the dialogue surrounding carceral practices in lived experience. We aim to expand access to APWA as an outlet for a wider range of backgrounds, identities, and perspectives by collaborating with a collective of Prison Witness Gatherers. We hope to source these Gatherers through partnerships with organizations and individuals who can adopt our call as a piece of their outreach, and actively widen the flow of essays, for an annual stipend of $2000. This is flexible and dependent on each Gatherer's engagement with incarcerated individuals.

If you are interested in assisting with our call, please contact us via prisonwitness@jh.edu