State Librarian’s Update – September 2026

September 4th, 2026

It seems like the summer went by too fast – I hope things slow down so we can enjoy the fall. I wanted to mention a couple of things that NJSL is involved with that will be launching this fall.

With LibraryLink NJ and the NJ AI Hub, we’re working on the AI Library Literacy Network. The AILLN is building a cohort of library staff from five libraries to serve as AI trainers using a curriculum from one of the AI Hub’s founding partners, Microsoft. In addition to building essential knowledge and skills around using generative AI, training on the use of AI for job-seeking will also be offered. We’re excited that the cohort will also be training staff from additional libraries beginning early next year. If you’re interested, please be in touch with Andrea Levandowski, who is NJSL’s staff member managing the project.

In other AI-related news, we learned recently that we were awarded an IMLS National Leadership grant for a project called Engaging Communities with Artificial Intelligence. Designed as a three-year project in partnership with The GovLab and the state libraries in Hawaii and Montana, the project will build out mobile-based educational modules on AI. The project will later bring together groups of people through libraries in each state to reflect on community concerns and ideate AI solutions with Fellows from the GovLab. The Fellows will take the ideas back to the GovLab and build AI tools that address one or more concerns. It is an exciting project and one of only two IMLS awards to state libraries this year. We’ll post about it periodically, but if you’re interested in more details, please contact me at jnelson@njstatelib.org.

And finally, we were granted a one-year extension to the Teaching Information Literacy IMS grant-funded project. We’ll be launching the website with the newly developed learning activities later in September and are planning several different trainings throughout the year. The session recordings from July’s Reimagining Information Literacy National Forum will also be posted in September, and we hope you’ll enjoy listening to the speakers. Jen Brenner is managing the activities this year; please be in touch with her with questions or for more information.

Jen Nelson

State Librarian