Kedgwick Public Library may be small for a library, at 200 square metres, but it makes a big impact in the northern community about 80 kilometres southwest of Campbellton.
Offering everything from a children’s garden to a community kitchen to clubs for seniors, this is much more than a place to borrow books. In a way, it’s like a community glue.
The federal government is seeking contributions to Canada’s Voluntary National Review for the United Nations Sustainable Development goals, and CFLA is working with the IFLA North America Regional Division Committee’s Canadian members to coordinate a response.
We’ll be focusing our submission on three specific goals. We’re looking for examples of contributions from the library sector since 2023, such as innovative initiatives and solutions, partnerships and collaborations, community-led actions that show measurable results, and efforts that have strengthened resilience or addressed barriers to sustainable development.
You’re invited to join a focus group or share an example through a survey. If you’d like to join us, please RSVP by Tuesday November 10 for one or more of the focus groups below using this form and we will send you a meeting invitation:
If you can’t join us, but would like to draw our attention to a collaborative action by libraries or a report demonstrating impact of libraries, you can share it here by Friday November 19: https://forms.gle/iD9D7CcT7bkQU8h19
Prior to the focus group or your online submission, please read about Canada’s ambitions and indicators for the relevant SDG to help shape your contributions:
Canisia Lubrin, David A. Robertson and Miriam Toews are among the finalists for the 2026 Governor General’s Literary Awards.
The prizes, administered by the Canada Council for the Arts, are awarded in seven English-language categories: fiction, nonfiction, poetry, young people’s literature — text, young people’s literature — illustration, drama and French-to-English translation. Seven French-language awards are also given out in the same categories.
About 5,500 Nova Scotia school support staff workers will not go on strike Monday after reaching a tentative deal with the province late Friday evening.
A strike would have involved support staff such as early childhood educators, librarians and student support workers.
A second attempt to attract interest in a new location for the Michael Donovan Library has come to naught, forcing government to reach out to potential landlords to see if space is available for the popular facility.
The Department of Transportation and Infrastructure says previous procurement processes failed to result in a proposal that meets the library’s operational and service requirements.
Five books covering a range of ideas and issues, from how women age to toxic hockey culture, have been shortlisted for the 2026 Balsillie Prize for Public Policy.
The annual prize awards $70,000 to a work of nonfiction that advances public discourse.
The shortlisted books are Dennis Molinaro’s Under Assault, Moira Welsh’s The Astonishing Lives of Older Women, Rick Westhead’s We Breed Lions, Jesse Winter’s Wild Fire and Tim Wu’s The Age of Extraction.
Continue reading “5 books shortlisted for $70K Balsillie Prize for Public Policy”
The union representing school support workers says it received indication from the province that the government is willing to return to the bargaining table on Thursday.
“We look forward to seeing government’s revised position and are confident that they have heard from Nova Scotians how important school support workers are to our communities,” Canadian Union of Public Employees said in a news release. “We will be happy to recommend a tentative agreement to our members that addresses their significant and serious concerns about their working conditions and compensation.”
The union representing more than 5,500 school support workers says if no deal is reached with the government and employers in the next few days, then members will walk off the job as early as Monday.
CUPE and the government as well as school boards reached an impasse in negotiations earlier this month. Positions affected include janitors, early childhood educators, cafeteria workers and more.
Key issues are quality of education and wages.
Continue reading “Nova Scotia: School support union plans for strike Monday if no deal reached”
Tara Gereaux, Michelle Good, Nicholas Herring, Nazanine Hozar and Patmeena Sabit are the five writers shortlisted for the 2026 Giller Prize.
The $100,000 award annually recognizes the best in Canadian fiction.
The 2026 shortlist features five novels, covering a wide range of material, from a historical fiction set in 1940s Saskatchewan (Gereaux’s Wild People Quiet) to a contemporary story about a road trip from New Brunswick to Toronto (Herring’s Your Breath in Charcoal) and a harrowing novel about child soldiers in the Iran-Iraq war (Hozar’s The Small Ones).
Continue reading “$100K Giller Prize announces 5-title shortlist for 2026”
Nova Scotia’s school support workers will be in a legal strike position beginning Monday, but the earliest they could walk off the job is Wednesday because doing so requires 48 hours’ notice.
The province’s regional centres for education and the Conseil scolaire acadien provincial have been in contract negotiations with the Canadian Union of Public Employees for several months.
The union represents 5,500 workers, including educational program assistants, early childhood educators in the pre-primary program, bus drivers, janitors, library support specialists, and Black and Mi’kmaw student support workers.
