What We Do
What does the High Plains Library District Friends & Foundation do?
A large portion of the Foundation's work goes towards funding essential and innovative library programs and services. We solicit funding on behalf of the District in the form of grants, private donations, corporate support, special events, and investment earnings. Our purpose is to diversify and create sustainable funding streams for the High Plains Library District in order to relieve dependency on tax revenue. We support librarians in producing high-quality library programs and services so that they may be available for present and future generations of library lovers. In 2022, the Foundation developed and implemented the coordination of volunteers within the HPLD libraries.
Our Funding Priorities
LINC Library Innovation Center
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Capital growth District-wide
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Programs supporting education and literacy among underserved populations
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Writer in Residence and literary arts
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High-impact District-wide programs
Programs and Services We Support
1,000 Books Before Kindergarten is the High Plains Library District’s primary early literacy program. The program aims to promote reading to newborns, infants, and toddlers so they are prepared to learn to read by the time they reach Kindergarten. The program’s goal is to instill a lifelong love of reading in young children throughout our community.
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The HPLD Friends & Foundation provides support for 1,000 Books Before Kindergarten through a grant from the Buell Foundation.
Summer Reading Adventure was developed to engage K-12 students in summer education in Literacy, Mathematics, Science and Social Studies/History. It was designed to specifically incorporate the District's mission; connecting communities to information, inspiration and entertainment. The purpose of the program is to combat anticipated "summer slide" and regression in learning experienced by many students
during summer break.
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The HPLD Friends & Foundation provides support for Summer Reading Adventure through funds designated from the HPLD Friends & Foundation Board and through sponsorships.
Multilingual Nursery Rhyme Booklets
The High Plains Library District collected nursery rhymes, finger plays, and songs from Weld County’s international community in their native languages (Somali, Burmese and French) to be complied into multilingual nursery rhyme booklets. The booklets are distributed through HPLD branch libraries and Outreach stops, as well as through the Immigrant and Refugee Center, Centennial Board of Cooperative Educational Services, and North Range Behavioral Health’s Home Instruction for parents of Preschool Youngsters home mentors.
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HPLD Friends and Foundation received multiple grants and board-designated funds to support this program.
YES!Fest
The Youth Engineering and Science Festival – YES!fest – promises to be a fun and educational festival for the whole family. Booths and exhibitors from across many science and engineering fields will provide hands-on activities for all age levels. YES!fest seeks to create a change in attitude toward engineering as a meaningful potential career option and emphasizes its relevance in our everyday lives.
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HPLD Friends and Foundation provides support from board-designated funds and sponsorships to support this program.
Carbon Valley Regional Library Nature Play Space
Carbon Valley seeks to add a Nature Play Space off of the Jan Cruz Nature Trial outside of their library. The Nature Play Space is an accessible play space that encourages natural play with earth elements of dirt, water, plants, wind, and sun. This space will include items like a mud kitchen, funnel stand, balance scale, tree blocks for building, stacking stones, sand table, water table, garden planters, and sensory plants.
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HPLD Friends and Foundation provides support through board-designated funds and sponsorships for this event.
General Programming Support
Sometimes opportunities are presented to the libraries after their funds have been budgeted for the entire year. Being community and customer service focused, HPLD staff frequently want to do more for our patrons but struggle finding the funds to offer more.
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HPLD Friends and Foundation provides support through sponsorships.
