prom night take 2

In 1997, Academy Award-winning actor Morgan Freeman offered to pay for the senior prom at Charleston High School in Mississippi under one condition: the prom had to be racially integrated. His offer was ignored. In 2008, Freeman offered again. This time the school board accepted, and history was made. Adults and teens (grade 9 and up) are invited to the Downtown Library Multi-Purpose Room for a special screening of the award-winning documentary which chronicles the events leading up to the ground-breaking prom.

Prom Night in Mississippi will be presented on Thursday, March 18 from 6:30-8:30 pm, and will be followed by an audience discussion led by the film's director, Paul Saltzman. This event is co-sponsored by the UM Community Scholars Program.

Bernstein conducting

Join us on Sunday, March 14, when the Ann Arbor District Library and the University Musical Society (UMS) will unveil two new collections as part of an ongoing collaboration to bring UMS archives online. We'll demonstrate how to browse and search thousands of pages of historical programs from the Society's first 100 seasons. We'll also provide a glimpse into our growing collection of over 900 photographs featuring backstage and candid shots of performers throughout UMS's rich history. Following a brief demonstration of each collection, UMS President Ken Fischer will highlight some memorable events and anecdotes from seasons past.

Sunday, March 14, 2-4 p.m. | Downtown Library Multi-Purpose Room

Time Bomb

AXIS Coffeehouse only has three weeks to go before we break for the summer, so we are going to make the most of it!

This Friday, March 12, local rap artist The Chozn Bravesoul will be visiting to talk a little about rap and poetry. And next Friday, March 19, we will host special guest Maggie Hanks of Ann Arbor Word Works, who will surely have some interesting writing ideas herself.

This free event offers snacks and great conversation as well as $5 library fine forgiveness coupons for those who present at the mic. Don't miss out on these awesome opportunities! Mallett's Creek, 6:30-8:00 pm. Be there!

aadl.org
Come to the downtown library for the Meet the Mac class on Friday, March 12th to practice using a Mac computer. We'll talk about all of the Mac stuff like the Dashboard, Dock, Widgets, Alias, Spotlight, and more. Ever lost a file on your computer? If so, we'll show you how to use the Finder to locate your files. Bring your Mac laptop along with you if you'd like!

Registration is required. Register online, visit any AADL location, or call 734-327-4555.

See you in class!

BIBTIF logo

Bring It Back, Take It Forward (BIBTIF), a 3-day conference celebrating 50 years of activism in southeast Michigan, will take place March 12-14, 2010. In this podcast, we talk with two of the conference organizers, Elizabeth Gonzalez and James Toy. Gonzalez, a graduate student in the UM School of Social Work, and Toy, a veteran activist and founding member of the University's Lesbian-Gay Male Programs Office in 1971, reflect on the achievements and challenges of activism in the late 1960s and early 1970s, as well as their hopes for the conference and the future of the progressive movement.

short story

Go ahead and put those finishing touches on your Short Story. The LAST day to turn in your story is March 19th/Friday by 9pm at any of the AADL locations, or, if you're emailing us your entry, you have until midnight! You can email your stories to allwrite@aadl.org

Guidelines are here. First, second and third place prizes will be awarded in three categories: Grades 6-8, Grades 9-10, Grades 11-12. "It's All Write!" features $1500 in prizes to be distributed among nine lucky winners. You can read the winning stories from last year. Click here.

We're lining up an amazing slate of judges, who are all published authors. Among the panel this year, Kathi Applet, who received a Newbery Honor Award last year, David Lubar, with witty books like Sleeping Freshmen Never Lie and My Rotten Life to his credit, and teen guru, Patrick Jones, author of Tear Collector
Good Luck!!

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With Michigan's high unemployment rate, many are scrambling to find new career paths and a way to transfer skill sets from one industry to the next. Now, there is a solution! A free online program called LEARN. A collaboration of Michigan-based Maria Madeline Project, Inc., the UM Ross School of Business, AADL and 4 other library systems, and WJBK, Fox 2, Detroit; LEARN provides university-level e-learning and career re-branding courses for unemployed Michigan workers with the goal of preparing more than 100,000 unemployed Michiganders to re-enter the workforce in a new career. LEARN's initial online class, "Redefining You Through a Career in Health Care" is available now at www.50plusprime.com. LEARN career re-branding courses are free and will focus on the following industries: health care, government and non-profit, emerging technologies, and entrepreneurship. LEARN courses are developed by Lynn Perry Wooten, PH.D., Clinical Associate Professor of Strategy, Management and Organizations at the UM Ross School of Business in collaboration with Maria Madeline Project, Inc.