TEAM UPDATE: Small Victories

We all know that the funding landscape is something more like a treacherous Martian dystopia at the moment… strange, hard to navigate, a little hard to breathe, and constantly under attack by creatures that sneak up on you! In our position as an R1 University, even though our main funding is not federal (thanks Mellon!), this has also made things really difficult as everyone scrambles to cover unexpected tasks and hard-to-make choices. We’re all wearing more hats than is necessary in this hot summer weather, and we want to thank all of you out there doing the same!

But we do have some good news!

Some may know that prior to the Mellon funding, we were funded by the IMLS Laura Bush 21st Century Librarian Program and that that funding should be coming to a close soon. You may also be aware that several, if not nearly all IMLS grants came to a screeching halt in the Spring! This threw us for quite a loop, and we were not able to work as intently on our deliverables for that time frame. Now for the good news: We were able to successfully apply for an extension which will secure us time through January 2026 to complete our project! Not to worry… the plates continued to spin, so we are up for the challenge and are looking forward to this extra time to complete the research components, video production and more!

Along with the theme of multiple hats and spinning plates… part of our Mellon funds are dedicated to new hires which we listed in another post. However, in addition to the federal funding issues, there were also some budget constraints for the State of Maryland which caused a hiring freeze to go into effect for the University of Maryland. We were able to get approval to hire since the Mellon funds were not federal and had not been rescinded, but obstacles persisted. We are working on it and really hope to share the job listings with you soon! We know that this can be frustrating (we are frustrated too!), but we will do all that we can to get the word out, extend deadlines, and the like to the best of our abilities! We have also received a letter from Mellon letting us know that they acknowledged our struggles and are unperturbed. We’re also happy to share that Mellon has approved a subaward to the University of Virginia to allow some crucial work to continue in collaboration with them.

The last little bit of good news is that our SNACSchool programs for the Fall are going well, and a new class of trainees has completed the 2-day Create and Edit session as of this afternoon! Registration for our September 3 and October 14-15 SNACSchool events are still live (Register Here!) and the virtual component of our Indigenous Edit-A-Thon scheduled for November 14 is also still live as well (Register Here!).

Exciting updates are still in the works, and you can check back here monthly to track our progress!