In Final Round of Grants, Gates Foundation Gives $6.5M To Upgrade Library Computers

Third round of Opportunity Online grants serves 11 states; ; advocacy training required

Norman Oder -- Library Journal, 07/20/2009

• Third round of hardware grants
• Part of $350M in domestic library support
• $3.7M local match expected

The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has announced its third and final round of Opportunity Online hardware grants, $6.5 million in grants to public libraries in 11 states. While the foundation, which has invested $350 million in domestic library support, did not initially aim to pay for hardware, it has recognized the need to upgrade and add public computer workstations in low-income areas, especially given the increasing demand for Internet access at libraries.

Last year’s round was worth $8.1 million, while the 2007 grants totaled $8.3 million. The remaining 18 U.S. states participated in the foundation’s Public Access Computing Hardware Upgrade Grant program in 2006.

In the current round, nearly 800 library branches in Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, Vermont, and Wisconsin are eligible. The libraries are expected to leverage $3.7 million in local funding.

Advocacy part of project
The foundation said that library staffers participating in the grant program must attend Turning the Page: Building Your Library Community, an advocacy training program offered by the Public Library Association.

The intermediary organizations to manage the grant include Bibliographical Center for Research, Hawaii State Public Library System, Illinois State Library, Indiana State Library, Minnesota State Library Services, Missouri State Library, Nebraska Library Commission, NELINET, State Library of Ohio, South Dakota State Library, and Wisconsin Department of Public Instruction, Division for Libraries, Technology, and Community Learning.