CMLC Announces Artist for New Central Library’s Public Art Program International artist Christian Moeller to create three-piece sculpture and a mural that uses 11,000 booksCALGARY, AB — Calgary Municipal Land Corporation (CMLC) — lead developer of Calgary’s Central Library, a $245 million fully-funded civic amenity in the re-emerging neighbourhood of East Village — is delighted to announce the public art installations for the New Central Library and to introduce the artist who’ll create them.“Our search for an artist whose work would befit a landmark facility like the New Central Library began in 2014, when we issued a Request for Qualifications (RFQ) from local, national and international artists,” says Susan Veres, senior vice president of strategy & business development. “More than two hundred artists and artist teams from all over the world responded to the RFQ—an emphatic testament to the significance of the opportunity.”The budget for the commission was guided by City of Calgary’s Public Art Policy, which includes a “percent for public art” strategy for funding the acquisition, administration and management of public art in Calgary. To complete the public art installations for the New Central Library, the selected artist worked with a budget of $2 million which is inclusive of all fees, expenses, and fabrication costs, delivery and installation.Through a robust and multi-staged selection process which was informed by the City of Calgary’s Public Art Program, the responses CMLC received—239 in total—were first narrowed to a list of 35. The task of establishing a shortlist to then advance to a Request for Proposals (RFP) stage was guided by a Volunteer Art Committee comprising a community resident, an artist and representative from ACAD, a curator from Glenbow Museum, a rep from Calgary Public Library and a rep from Calgary Arts Development organization. Non-voting members/observers included reps from CMLC, City of Calgary Public Art Program and the NCL design team.Read the complete media release on CMLC's website.
Read more about "Stories"For years, a gold framed photograph lay in a drawer in Central Library’s Local History workroom.The black and white photograph shows Chief and Artist Sitting Wind holding his painting, looking at his work with a proud yet reflective gaze. In the painting, people converge outside four teepees that stand tall beneath a mountain backdrop.Aside from the five-line caption, little is known about the piece and how Calgary Public Library came to hold it.“Bowness Public Library” and “1962” are mentioned in the caption. Bowness was a separate town in 1962, and the town’s library was not yet part of the Calgary Public Library system. The photograph’s journey from Bowness Library to Central Library’s Local History workroom is also vague. But it fell into the spotlight recently, as Local History Librarian Carolyn Ryder began examining the Library’s collection in preparation for the upcoming move to the new Central Library.“We’re looking at a handful of items in our collection that haven’t been processed; we don’t have provenance on them,” Ryder says. “We’re asking if we are the most appropriate place for these items.”Such questions have not always been asked — within libraries and other collections-based institutions.Inside museums, for example, many Indigenous collections contain artifacts that were gathered or confiscated in the late 1800s and early 1900s.Later, more efforts were made to deny Indigenous ways of knowing, being, and doing, including residential schools and the Sixties Scoop.In recent years, as Canadians have started to acknowledge this disastrous colonial past, the return of cultural property to Indigenous nations has become more common. Such repatriation is one step toward reconciliation.In the case of the Sitting Wind photograph at the Library, the piece’s journey home began in late 2017. Librarian Carolyn Ryder told Teneya Gwin, Indigenous Service Design Lead, about the item.Gwin reached out to Joanne Schmidt, Acting Curator of Indigenous Studies at the Glenbow Museum. Through a cultural organization, Schmidt connected with a friend of the late Sitting Wind who said she could deliver the photograph back to his family.“It’s gone home,” Gwin says. “I think this should be a very proud moment for the Library. Not all organizations realize the cultural significance of some of the items they have in their collection.”Sitting Wind, born Frank Morin on February 28,1925, was given the name Sitting Wind from a Medicine Man when he was a baby.When Sitting Wind’s mother died when he was four, his grandmother and step-grandfather adopted him (and renamed him Frank Kaquitts). He moved from the central Alberta community of Hobbema (now known as Maskwacis) to Morley, a reserve northwest of Calgary, where he later went to residential school. Born a Cree, he was raised a Stoney.Sitting Wind was a soldier, a boxer, a landscape artist who attended the Banff School of Fine Arts, and an actor, known for his role in the 1976 film Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull’s History Lesson starring Paul Newman.He was also a politician, first elected to serve on the Bearspaw Band Council in 1957, then elected Chief in 1961. When the Stoney Nakoda people voted in favour of merging the Bearspaw, Chiniki, and Wesley First Nations in 1974, Sitting Wind was the first-ever grand Chief of the briefly united Stoney Tribe. Following the return to the three-band system, Sitting Wind served as Chief of the Chiniki Band.Sitting Wind died in 2002, at age 77. His friend — tasked with returning his photo to his family — remembers him as an informed leader, accomplished artist, and jovial human.While the Chief Sitting Wind photograph has gone home, the Library’s work in this area is not over. The Library has a headdress in its Local History collection, also with an unknown story.“The significance of a headdress is enormous,” Gwin says. “For the Library to have one, we need to honour it in an appropriate way or give it back to who it belongs to. We’re working on that.”For Joanne Schmidt, with the Glenbow Museum, helping people with the repatriation process is a growing part of her job. “More and more, I’m having people contact me and say they want to return something to its rightful place, to the community where it came from,” she says.Sometimes that homecoming is straightforward, like it was with the Chief Sitting Wind photo. The roots of other belongings can be harder to trace, such as the headdress the Library has. Returning sacred and ceremonial items can come with further challenges.But cultural property does not help museums, libraries, or individual collectors in the same way it helps the communities where it came from, Schmidt says.“If you can send it back to the community, they can learn new skills, they get a sense of cultural pride, a reconnection to their ancestors, a way to teach their youth,” she says. “All kinds of things can happen that will never come out of it sitting on a desk or hanging on a wall.”Read more about Chief Sitting Wind’s life in The Song and the Silence: Sitting Wind, an award-winning biography by Peter Jonker.
Read more about "Stories Reconciliation at the Library: A Photograph's Journey Home"Deciding to apply for citizenship in a new country is a big decision, but it’s also exciting. If your goal is to become a Canadian citizen, you can start preparing for your citizenship test right now from home.Use your free Library card to access these resources from the Digital Library. They make studying simple and stress free!Don’t have a Library card? You can sign up for free online and start using it immediately.Learn about your rightsFind out all you need to know about the rights and responsibilities of Canadian citizens by downloading the official study guide for the citizenship test. This guide is provided by the Government of Canada and contains information about the history of Canada, how our government works, symbols of Canada and its regions, and more.BrainFuseConnect with tutors online to get answers to your questions as you prepare for the Canadian Citizenship Test. Tutors are available from 2 pm to 11 pm every day. BrainFuse also has an adult learning centre that includes Canadian Citizenship practice tests and resources to help you excel. Canadian EncyclopediaUse this resource to learn more about Canada’s history and culture through images, maps, videos, timelines, and other media. The Canadian Encyclopedia also provides classroom resources, quizzes, and study guides.Road to IELTSNewcomers to Canada can expand their verbal and written communication skills with this resource. Road to IELTS can help you prepare for the International English Language Testing System exam with Reading, Listening, Speaking and Writing courses. You can also use a personalized study planner to stay on track.
Read more about "Stories Preparing for the Canadian Citizenship Test from Home"To mark National Aboriginal History Month in June 2017, Calgary Public Library is displaying Indigenous art at four libraries.Samuel BighettySamuel Bighetty’s art tells the story of the Mathias Colomb Cree Nation in Pukatawagan, Manitoba. Using bright, beautiful colours, his artwork tells the story of hardships and change. Bighetty describes such change through the analogy of a caterpillar turning into a butterfly. “It looks real ugly, walking on the ground,” Bighetty says. “A caterpillar doesn’t know it’s going to turn into something beautiful. [Then] it changes, flies around, has all the colours.” Jessica Liening-WolfeIndigenous artist Jessica Liening-Wolfe showcases her Ojibway culture through traditional beadwork and jewelry. “My mother was a former student of the residential school, so she didn’t grow up with her culture or her language, so I feel that it is up to me to go out there and regain this knowledge,” says Liening-Wolfe. Taylor McPhersonThrough her artistic journey, Taylor McPherson has reclaimed her Miawpukek identity, and is now challenging people to see past stereotypes with her work. Her self-portrait, titled “Identity,” has been displayed across Canada, and found a new home at Judith Umbach Library in June 2017. “To have people recognize my Aboriginal work really means a lot, because I feel a lot of people have been more appreciative in learning about the stories behind it,” McPherson says. Nathan MeguinisNathan Meguinis started drawing at the age of five. His artwork today reflects the deep roots of his Tsuut’ina culture and heritage. Meguinis says what makes Tsuut’ina art distinctive in style is its reflection of Tsuut’ina history and spiritual connections: a belief in one God, one creation, and everything being intertwined. He strives to give people a deeper understanding of his traditional culture through his art. “I’m hoping to enlighten people about the realities that my people faced through my artwork, and at the same time share my culture,” Meguinis says.
Read more about "Stories Indigenous Art Featured at Calgary Public Library"Deciding to apply for citizenship in a new country is a big decision, but it’s also exciting. If your goal is to become a Canadian citizen, you can start preparing for your citizenship test right now from home.Use your free Library card to access these resources from the Digital Library. They make studying simple and stress free!Don’t have a Library card? You can sign up for free online and start using it immediately.Learn about your rightsFind out all you need to know about the rights and responsibilities of Canadian citizens by downloading the official study guide for the citizenship test. This guide is provided by the Government of Canada and contains information about the history of Canada, how our government works, symbols of Canada and its regions, and more.BrainFuseConnect with tutors online to get answers to your questions as you prepare for the Canadian Citizenship Test. Tutors are available from 2 pm to 11 pm every day. BrainFuse also has an adult learning centre that includes Canadian Citizenship practice tests and resources to help you excel. Canadian EncyclopediaUse this resource to learn more about Canada’s history and culture through images, maps, videos, timelines, and other media. The Canadian Encyclopedia also provides classroom resources, quizzes, and study guides.Road to IELTSNewcomers to Canada can expand their verbal and written communication skills with this resource. Road to IELTS can help you prepare for the International English Language Testing System exam with Reading, Listening, Speaking and Writing courses. You can also use a personalized study planner to stay on track.
Read more about "Stories Preparing for the Canadian Citizenship Test from Home"Borrow books, digital books, audiobooks, DVDs, CDs, magazines, newspapers, and even musical instruments from our collection of nearly 1.4 million items.
Read more about "Over 100 digital resources"Learn amazing fact, such as which bird of prey is like a stealth bomber! This program acquaints participants with the different birds of prey found in Alberta, including hawks...
Read more about "STEM Explorers: Birds of Prey"1. Read from our Treaty 7 children’s book collectionHave you joined the Challenge? Kids ages 0 – 17 can register for the Ultimate Summer Challenge and track their reading with books like these from our Treaty 7 children’s book collection. Sign up at calgarylibrary.ca/summer.2. Read Stepping Stones for help understanding the curriculumStepping Stones is a publication of the Alberta Teachers’ Association Walking Together: Education for Reconciliation. It supports teachers on their learning journey to meet the First Nations, Métis, and Inuit Foundational Knowledge competency in the Teaching Quality Standard. Parents and caregivers may also find the documents useful to build understanding of their child’s classroom curriculum, especially the Terminology Reference and Numbered Treaties: Treaty 7 documents. The Alberta map of Treaty Areas can also be downloaded at the link.3. Go to a museum virtuallyExplore Blackfoot culture and listen to Elders tell stories, like Sky Stories and Indigenous astronomy, through the Glenbow Museum’s Niitsitpiisini: Our Way of Life and The Virtual Museum of Canada.4. Watch Indigenous authors and illustrators on YoutubeLearn from Indigenous authors and illustrators through the Canadian Children’s Book Centre’s Indigenous channel on YouTube.5. Meet an ElderMeet an Indigenous Elder, attend an Indigenous Storytime and more, FREE with your Library card at our Indigenous Services page.6. Browse the Indigenous Peoples Atlas of CanadaFor grades five and up, Canadian Geographic Indigenous Peoples Atlas of Canada is available free in the Digital Library.7. Play games and listen to a podcastCBC Kids is a great resource for elementary school students with virtual games, online articles, video clips, and more about Canada’s Indigenous cultures. The Métis Nation of Alberta’s Youth Programs and Services team also has a podcast created by youth, for youth, called Keeping It Riel.8. Explore your own backyardAs Covid restrictions lift, explore your own backyard by visiting historic sites such as those at Blackfoot Crossing (which includes the site of the signing of Treaty 7), Writing on Stone, Head Smashed in Buffalo Jump, Métis Crossing, and in downtown Calgary, the confluence of the Bow and Elbow rivers at Fort Calgary. Indigenous Tourism Alberta is a great resource to find out where to camp, visit, shop, and more.9. Attend a PowwowThere are thousands of Powwow held across North America every summer and they are open to everyone to attend. Remember to dress in long pants or dresses, sit in areas for spectators (not Elders, dancers, or drummers) and avoid touching regalia or picking up an eagle feather — even though they are beautiful!10. Read stories by Indigenous authorsRead together and learn from the lived experiences of Indigenous authors with a Library booklist, or check out the Prairie Indigenous eBook Collection. The first of its kind in Canada, this collection increases access to stories by Indigenous authors and writings about Indigenous culture. Check out over 200 eBook titles from publishers in Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta.This blog post is published as part of The Kitchen Table Classroom: A Series to Support Learning from Home, a partnership with Edmonton Public Library. Visit our website for information on the next live, online workshop in the series and for more tips and tools to support learning from home.
Read more about "Stories 10 Ideas for Kids to Learn More about Treaty 7 and Métis Culture This Summer Books, videos, backyard adventures, and more will help enrich your knowledge of Indigenous culture and history."Last July, David Greer travelled from his home in Vancouver to Calgary’s Central Library, hoping to meet the people who helped him find his birth father.More than a year earlier, David had written a letter to ResearchPlus, a fee-based research and reference service at Central Library.In his letter, David explained how he was adopted as a baby in Edmonton in 1957, and for decades was fine knowing nothing about his birth family. That changed when he turned 60. He decided he wanted to find out who his birth parents were and see if he could connect with them or their families.David had applied for his records from the Alberta Post Adoption Registry in 2017. Four months later, he received a heavily redacted file and began to glean what he could about his past.The Search BeginsDavid found support from the Forget Me Not Family Society in Vancouver, which led him to connect with an Edmonton counsellor who specializes in helping adoptees find their birth parents. With the counsellor’s help, David identified his birth mother.The search for his birth father proved more difficult. David’s adoption file included no name for his birth father and just a few details. David knew his birth father lived in Calgary when he was born, was 17 years old and in Grade 12, was interested in basketball, swimming, and track, had three siblings, and a father who was an anesthetist.“I was really stuck at that point,” David says. David had previously used Vancouver Public Library’s specialized research centre, and when he learned Calgary Public Library had a similar service, he reached out.In his letter, David outlined the details he knew from his adoption file. “I said, ‘I’ve taken my search this far, can you take it any further?’ And the answer was yes,” David says. “Librarians are really smart people, and they know how to access a lot of information that we don’t necessarily think of or know of.”ResearchPlus Steps InCalgary Public Library offers free genealogy programs, such as Family History Coaching, run in partnership with the Alberta Family Histories Society. As well, the eLibrary contains a variety of free history and genealogy resources, plus Library staff at Central Library can help patrons navigate the Calgary’s Story collection, full of community heritage and family history resources.David was not in Calgary to access those free services, so he turned to ResearchPlus instead. Four Library staff members helped on David’s file, including Kayla McAlister, a Library Experience Facilitator at Central Library.Kayla says one small detail — that David’s birth father’s father was an anesthetist — is what “broke it open.”Library staff used a free Digital Resource called Ancestry Library Edition. The database contains voters’ lists, which typically include occupation. Kayla searched by occupation only, and got just a few hits.From there, another staff member, Christine Hayes, used those names to search high school yearbooks in the Calgary’s Story collection. She found a student whose last name matched one of the last names for an anesthetist on the voters’ list. The yearbook also listed the student’s interests, which matched the description from David’s file.Using that name, other members of the ResearchPlus team found more information, through other free resources including Henderson Directories and Canadian Newsstream. The ResearchPlus team shared their detailed findings with David.Kayla has been involved in genealogy research for about 25 years and says it’s a rewarding area to work in. “It’s just a way for me to help people,” she says. “It means something to people, finding this fundamental piece of who they are and where they came from.”A New ConnectionWith the information from ResearchPlus, David found a phone number for the man he believed was his birth father. Last October, he dialed the number. He got an answering machine, called again a few days later, and spoke to his birth father for 45 minutes.“He shared that for the last couple of years, he wondered when he got unknown phone calls if it would be me,” David says.Seven months after that phone call, David travelled to Ontario to meet his birth father and three new brothers. David has also gotten to know two sisters on his birth mother’s side, who he talks to regularly through a WhatsApp group chat.He’s been introduced to many extended family members on both sides, and continues to meet even more. “It’s been an amazing experience,” David says.When David travelled to Calgary in July to visit his two sisters on his birth mother’s side, he decided to stop by Central Library and meet the people who helped him on his search.“Meeting the team members face to face was just a piece of completion for me,” David says. “The work they did was incredibly valuable to me.”Guinevere Soare, a Library Experience Facilitator at Central Library who helped on David’s file, was working the day David stopped by.“I’m really, really happy for him, that he found this new extended family,” she says. “It was rewarding to hear his story and know we helped him.”
Read more about "Stories 'The work they did was incredibly valuable to me' ResearchPlus staff contributed to David Greer's Library Story by helping him find his birth father"For years, a gold framed photograph lay in a drawer in Central Library’s Local History workroom.The black and white photograph shows Chief and Artist Sitting Wind holding his painting, looking at his work with a proud yet reflective gaze. In the painting, people converge outside four teepees that stand tall beneath a mountain backdrop.Aside from the five-line caption, little is known about the piece and how Calgary Public Library came to hold it.“Bowness Public Library” and “1962” are mentioned in the caption. Bowness was a separate town in 1962, and the town’s library was not yet part of the Calgary Public Library system.The photograph’s journey from Bowness Library to Central Library’s Local History workroom is also vague. But it fell into the spotlight recently, as Local History Librarian Carolyn Ryder began examining the Library’s collection in preparation for the upcoming move to the new Central Library.“We’re looking at a handful of items in our collection that haven’t been processed; we don’t have provenance on them,” Ryder says. “We’re asking if we are the most appropriate place for these items.”Such questions have not always been asked — within libraries and other collections-based institutions.Inside museums, for example, many Indigenous collections contain artifacts that were gathered or confiscated in the late 1800s and early 1900s.Later, more efforts were made to deny Indigenous ways of knowing, being, and doing, including residential schools and the Sixties Scoop.In recent years, as Canadians have started to acknowledge this disastrous colonial past, the return of cultural property to Indigenous nations has become more common. Such repatriation is one step toward reconciliation.In the case of the Sitting Wind photograph at the Library, the piece’s journey home began in late 2017. Librarian Carolyn Ryder told Teneya Gwin, Indigenous Service Design Lead, about the item.Gwin reached out to Joanne Schmidt, Acting Curator of Indigenous Studies at the Glenbow Museum. Through a cultural organization, Schmidt connected with a friend of the late Sitting Wind who said she could deliver the photograph back to his family.“It’s gone home,” Gwin says. “I think this should be a very proud moment for the Library. Not all organizations realize the cultural significance of some of the items they have in their collection.”Sitting Wind, born Frank Morin on February 28,1925, was given the name Sitting Wind from a Medicine Man when he was a baby.When Sitting Wind’s mother died when he was four, his grandmother and step-grandfather adopted him (and renamed him Frank Kaquitts). He moved from the central Alberta community of Hobbema (now known as Maskwacis) to Morley, a reserve northwest of Calgary, where he later went to residential school. Born a Cree, he was raised a Stoney.Sitting Wind was a soldier, a boxer, a landscape artist who attended the Banff School of Fine Arts, and an actor, known for his role in the 1976 film Buffalo Bill and the Indians, or Sitting Bull’s History Lesson starring Paul Newman.He was also a politician, first elected to serve on the Bearspaw Band Council in 1957, then elected Chief in 1961. When the Stoney Nakoda people voted in favour of merging the Bearspaw, Chiniki, and Wesley First Nations in 1974, Sitting Wind was the first-ever grand Chief of the briefly united Stoney Tribe. Following the return to the three-band system, Sitting Wind served as Chief of the Chiniki Band.Sitting Wind died in 2002, at age 77. His friend — tasked with returning his photo to his family — remembers him as an informed leader, accomplished artist, and jovial human.While the Chief Sitting Wind photograph has gone home, the Library’s work in this area is not over. The Library has a headdress in its Local History collection, also with an unknown story.“The significance of a headdress is enormous,” Gwin says. “For the Library to have one, we need to honour it in an appropriate way or give it back to who it belongs to. We’re working on that.”For Joanne Schmidt, with the Glenbow Museum, helping people with the repatriation process is a growing part of her job. “More and more, I’m having people contact me and say they want to return something to its rightful place, to the community where it came from,” she says.Sometimes that homecoming is straightforward, like it was with the Chief Sitting Wind photo. The roots of other belongings can be harder to trace, such as the headdress the Library has. Returning sacred and ceremonial items can come with further challenges.But cultural property does not help museums, libraries, or individual collectors in the same way it helps the communities where it came from, Schmidt says.“If you can send it back to the community, they can learn new skills, they get a sense of cultural pride, a reconnection to their ancestors, a way to teach their youth,” she says. “All kinds of things can happen that will never come out of it sitting on a desk or hanging on a wall.”Read more about Chief Sitting Wind’s life in The Song and the Silence: Sitting Wind, an award-winning biography by Peter Jonker.
Read more about "Stories Reconciliation at the Library: A Photograph's Journey Home"Lynda.com, an eResource with thousands of professional learning videos at the click of your keyboard, just became better. LinkedIn retired Lynda.com and replaced it with LinkedIn Learning for Library. The site continues to provide great skill-building content, but now it is a more personalized learning experience. LinkedIn Learning combines Lynda.com’s courses with LinkedIn’s customization to recommend courses based on your interests, occupation, and skills.With your free Library card, you can access more than 16,000 self-paced courses in seven languages, hundreds of online resources to help reinforce new knowledge, and tutorials covering topics on business, technology, design, and more.LinkedIn Learning for Library is available through our Digital Library portal.What does this mean for Library members?Library members will continue to have free access to the same great courses from Lynda.com, but the upgraded experience is more user-friendly. All the existing Lynda.com content, features, and functionalities are still available in LinkedIn Learning for Library. Your course history from Lynda.com transferred to your new LinkedIn Learning for Library account under your existing Library card number.How can I access LinkedIn Learning for Library?It’s in our Digital Library. Members can sign in to LinkedIn Learning for Library using their Library card number and PIN. A LinkedIn profile is not required to access the site’s content through the Library. If you don’t have a Library membership, you can sign up for a free account online and start using your card immediately.What if I don’t remember my Library card number?If you’ve forgotten your Library card number or PIN, call the Library Hotline for further support. Please note that if you are issued a new Library card or account, you will no longer have access to your course history. More information on LinkedIn Learning for Library can be found here.
Read more about "Stories Lynda.com is now LinkedIn Learning for Library. Here’s what you need to know."Deciding to apply for citizenship in a new country is a big decision, but it’s also exciting. If your goal is to become a Canadian citizen, you can start preparing for your citizenship test right now from home.Use your free Library card to access these resources from the Digital Library. They make studying simple and stress free!Don’t have a Library card? You can sign up for free online and start using it immediately.Learn about your rightsFind out all you need to know about the rights and responsibilities of Canadian citizens by downloading the official study guide for the citizenship test. This guide is provided by the Government of Canada and contains information about the history of Canada, how our government works, symbols of Canada and its regions, and more.BrainFuseConnect with tutors online to get answers to your questions as you prepare for the Canadian Citizenship Test. Tutors are available from 2 pm to 11 pm every day. BrainFuse also has an adult learning centre that includes Canadian Citizenship practice tests and resources to help you excel. Canadian EncyclopediaUse this resource to learn more about Canada’s history and culture through images, maps, videos, timelines, and other media. The Canadian Encyclopedia also provides classroom resources, quizzes, and study guides.Road to IELTSNewcomers to Canada can expand their verbal and written communication skills with this resource. Road to IELTS can help you prepare for the International English Language Testing System exam with Reading, Listening, Speaking and Writing courses. You can also use a personalized study planner to stay on track.
Read more about "Stories Preparing for the Canadian Citizenship Test from Home"Last July, David Greer travelled from his home in Vancouver to Calgary’s Central Library, hoping to meet the people who helped him find his birth father.More than a year earlier, David had written a letter to ResearchPlus, a fee-based research and reference service at Central Library.In his letter, David explained how he was adopted as a baby in Edmonton in 1957, and for decades was fine knowing nothing about his birth family. That changed when he turned 60. He decided he wanted to find out who his birth parents were and see if he could connect with them or their families.David had applied for his records from the Alberta Post Adoption Registry in 2017. Four months later, he received a heavily redacted file and began to glean what he could about his past.The Search BeginsDavid found support from the Forget Me Not Family Society in Vancouver, which led him to connect with an Edmonton counsellor who specializes in helping adoptees find their birth parents. With the counsellor’s help, David identified his birth mother.The search for his birth father proved more difficult. David’s adoption file included no name for his birth father and just a few details. David knew his birth father lived in Calgary when he was born, was 17 years old and in Grade 12, was interested in basketball, swimming, and track, had three siblings, and a father who was an anesthetist.“I was really stuck at that point,” David says. David had previously used Vancouver Public Library’s specialized research centre, and when he learned Calgary Public Library had a similar service, he reached out.In his letter, David outlined the details he knew from his adoption file. “I said, ‘I’ve taken my search this far, can you take it any further?’ And the answer was yes,” David says. “Librarians are really smart people, and they know how to access a lot of information that we don’t necessarily think of or know of.”ResearchPlus Steps InCalgary Public Library offers free genealogy programs, such as Family History Coaching, run in partnership with the Alberta Family Histories Society. As well, the eLibrary contains a variety of free history and genealogy resources, plus Library staff at Central Library can help patrons navigate the Calgary’s Story collection, full of community heritage and family history resources.David was not in Calgary to access those free services, so he turned to ResearchPlus instead. Four Library staff members helped on David’s file, including Kayla McAlister, a Library Experience Facilitator at Central Library.Kayla says one small detail — that David’s birth father’s father was an anesthetist — is what “broke it open.”Library staff used a free Digital Resource called Ancestry Library Edition. The database contains voters’ lists, which typically include occupation. Kayla searched by occupation only, and got just a few hits.From there, another staff member, Christine Hayes, used those names to search high school yearbooks in the Calgary’s Story collection. She found a student whose last name matched one of the last names for an anesthetist on the voters’ list. The yearbook also listed the student’s interests, which matched the description from David’s file.Using that name, other members of the ResearchPlus team found more information, through other free resources including Henderson Directories and Canadian Newsstream. The ResearchPlus team shared their detailed findings with David.Kayla has been involved in genealogy research for about 25 years and says it’s a rewarding area to work in. “It’s just a way for me to help people,” she says. “It means something to people, finding this fundamental piece of who they are and where they came from.”A New ConnectionWith the information from ResearchPlus, David found a phone number for the man he believed was his birth father. Last October, he dialed the number. He got an answering machine, called again a few days later, and spoke to his birth father for 45 minutes.“He shared that for the last couple of years, he wondered when he got unknown phone calls if it would be me,” David says.Seven months after that phone call, David travelled to Ontario to meet his birth father and three new brothers. David has also gotten to know two sisters on his birth mother’s side, who he talks to regularly through a WhatsApp group chat.He’s been introduced to many extended family members on both sides, and continues to meet even more. “It’s been an amazing experience,” David says.When David travelled to Calgary in July to visit his two sisters on his birth mother’s side, he decided to stop by Central Library and meet the people who helped him on his search.“Meeting the team members face to face was just a piece of completion for me,” David says. “The work they did was incredibly valuable to me.”Guinevere Soare, a Library Experience Facilitator at Central Library who helped on David’s file, was working the day David stopped by.“I’m really, really happy for him, that he found this new extended family,” she says. “It was rewarding to hear his story and know we helped him.”
Read more about "Stories 'The work they did was incredibly valuable to me' ResearchPlus staff contributed to David Greer's Library Story by helping him find his birth father"Free Online Resources to Make Studying Easier Studying at home can be stressful, but these free online tools may help make it a little bit easier. From full theatre productions of Shakespeare plays to free online tutoring and practice tests, there’s a wide variety of quality digital resources to supplement your study sessions. We’ve highlighted a few major Alberta curriculum subject areas and some great digital resources to use along with them.French:Take the Learning French course from Kanopy's Great Courses collection, which includes a downloadable PDF workbook. Find photographs and articles about France in the National Geographic Virtual Library or read French magazines and newspapers on PressReader. L’encyclopedie Decouverte combines research with engaging activities to help beginners improve their French reading skills. Brush up on your French speaking and vocabulary with our free language learnings apps: Pronunciator, Transparent Language, and Rosetta Stone Library Solution. Science:Learn about famous scientists and research topics in applied sciences, biology, chemistry, earth science, energy, and astronomy with Science Reference Centre. Develop your scientific knowledge and skills with Learning Express, which has biology, chemistry, and earth science practice. Get Alberta curriculum-aligned online science tutoring with brainfuse HelpNow or access The Key practice tests and worksheets with SOLARO. Read teen science magazines like Brainspace for free on Flipster. Aboriginal Studies:Learn Indigenous languages such as Cree, Dakota, Oji-Cree, and Ojibwe from Transparent Language. Watch the documentary Indigenous Peoples of the Arctic from Kanopy's Great Courses collection and other international films about Indigenous topics, such as the classic Canadian film Nanook of the North. You can also watch films on Indigenous issues from the National Film Board of Canada on NFB Campus. Learn about Indigenous history, perspectives, cultures, and contemporary issues in the Indigenous Peoples Atlas of Canada. Study the colonial experience with Frontier Life, where you can find documents, maps, artwork, and photographs about settlers and Indigenous peoples of North America and beyond. Read SAY, a lifestyle magazine written about and for indigenous people and youth, on Flipster with any device. Math:Learning Express can help you improve your math skills with practice in algebra, data analysis, calculus, geometry, and more. Get Alberta curriculum-aligned online math tutoring with brainfuse HelpNow or access The Key practice tests and worksheets with SOLARO. Canada/Social Studies:Research Canada’s history and culture with articles from the Maclean’s Magazine Archive. The Canadian Encyclopedia lets you search for a specific topic on Canada’s history and culture or browse more than 30,000 multimedia items, including images, maps, games, audio, and video. Discover Canada’s historical figures with the Dictionary of Canadian Biography. Search over 8,500 biographies of Canadians in history. With Early Canadiana Online you can search for information on major historical events, the development of institutions, genealogy, Canadian literature and politics, trades and tariffs, and more from the 16th to 20th century. Get Alberta curriculum-aligned online social studies tutoring with brainfuse HelpNow or access practice tests and worksheets with SOLARO. English Language Arts:Find full-text scholarly journals, literary magazines, biographies, criticisms, summaries, and more with Literature Resource Centre. Learning Express can help you improve reading comprehension, writing, spelling, and grammar with their high school resources. Watch theatre productions and critical analyses of Shakespeare plays and other literary masterpieces on Kanopy. LitFinder lets you explore full-text poems, short stories, novels, essays, speeches, plays, biographies, summaries, and more. Get Alberta curriculum-aligned online ELA tutoring with brainfuse HelpNow or access practice tests and worksheets with SOLARO. Music:Part of the school band? Supplement your musical skills with a variety of expert-led vocal and instrument lessons on ArtistWorks and LinkedIn Learning for Library. If you need some good studying tunes, enjoy currently unlimited, ad-free streaming on Freegal Music or relax with classical music from Naxos Music Library. General Research:Find articles, newspapers, and references books covering all subject areas with MasterFILE Premier. Academic Search Premier gives you access to full-text and peer-reviewed academic journals, magazines, trade publications, and newspapers on all major areas of research. Not yet a Library member? Sign up online for your free Library card to get access to the Digital Library and more of the Library’s online resources immediately.
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