2018 By the Numbers - Annual Report

EveryLibrary was able to do a tremendous amount of good for public and school libraries in 2018.

EveryLibrary was able to do a tremendous amount of good for public and school libraries in 2018.

Thanks to the support of thousands of donors, we were able to help 17 public libraries on their Election Days, help dozens of school libraries stay open, help hold the line on federal funding for the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) when the President threatened to cut its budget, help our partners in numerous state library organizations with their legislative agendas, and engage tens of thousands of Americans about libraries and librarians.


Click here to download the full report and see everything that we accomplished in 2018


Our vision from the beginning is that "any library funding opportunity anywhere should matter to every library everywhere". We work every day to ensure that libraries are at the heart of every community and campus, and that librarians are there to help every individual succeed. It's why we are called EveryLibrary: we are all in this effort together. 

We invite you to read our full 2018 Annual Report where we talk about our campaigns, our partnerships, and our amazing donors and supporters in detail. Our "2018 By the Numbers" is a great quick read:

2018 By the Numbers

Public Library Campaigns

  • 96 library Election Days since 2012
  • 80% win rate
  • 6 new library districts set up by voters
  • A dozen new libraries built
  • $320 million dollars in annual funding
  • $1.7 billion dollars in total library funding

EveryLibrary’s “Donor ROI” (return on investment) means that for every $1 donated, we are able to raise $1,600 in stable long-term funding for libraries through our direct political action.

SaveSchoolLibrarians.org

  • 23 direct actions to save school libraries and librarians’ jobs
  • 17,000 emails to superintendents, principals, and school boards
  • 25,000 Americans pledged to support school librarians
  • Supported 2 statewide education funding ballot measures
  • Created 1 million advocacy ad impressions for school librarians in 2018

This level of support is critical when as few as 50 emails to a school board make the difference and help restore budgets and positions.

SaveIMLS, VoteLibraries Month, and “One Million Americans for Libraries” Campaign

  • Over 17,500 messages to Congress to SaveIMLS and reauthorize MLSA
  • The national Library Support Network grew from 110,000 to 275,000 in 12 months
  • 10 million ads about libraries on social media to Americans
  • 50 positive stories about libraries on Medium.com/EveryLibrary magazine
  • 45 partner organizations and companies shared the VoteLibraries message

With this network of engaged and activated Americas, EveryLibrary is the largest pro-library organization on social media. In fact, we reached an average of 128,000 Americans every single day in 2018 to tell them about the great things that libraries are doing across the country.


Click here to download the full report and see everything that we accomplished in 2018


Personal and Corporate Partners

  • 1,600 personal donors
  • 295 monthly personal donors
  • 2 successful “challenge match” campaigns
  • 1,100 attendees at 8 fundraising events
  • 50% of our funding is from small personal donors

Our corporate partners add capacity to our work and help to accelerate our efforts to help libraries succeed. We want to thank them for their amazing support in 2018, especially our project partners and party co-hosts.

Bibliotheca – Event co-sponsor for 2018 New Orleans Fundraiser
Bond Architects, Inc – Event sponsor for ARSL 2018 party
ByWater Solutions – 2018 Donor Challenge Match sponsor
Communico – “Throw an Axe for the Stacks” event sponsor at PLA 2018
Follett Learning – Founding sponsor for SaveSchoolLibrians.org
Gale, a Cengage company – Founding SaveIMLS.org sponsor
Kixal – The Political Librarian webinar series
Rosen Publishing — Lilead school librarian cohort training
SirsiDynix - Event co-sponsor for 2018 New Orleans Fundraiser
Zoobean / Beanstack – Event sponsor for ISTE 2018 Librarians Network party

Launched the EveryLibrary Institute

The EveryLibrary Institute is founded as a companion 501(c)3 non-profit in 2018. We intend to advance a voter- and public-facing research agenda that identifies the messages and tests the techniques that will reverse downward trends in voter perception of libraries. Our training program is designed to improve the political literacy skills of librarians, staff, and boards in public, school, and academic libraries. We are committed to disseminating our findings, learnings, and best practices for the entire library industry through an open access publishing program. The EveryLibrary Institute is aligned with programmatic partner organizations and funders who see school, public, and academic libraries as critical solutions to problems in education, civil society, and community well-being.

Thank You for Your Support in 2018

We invite you to read our full 2018 Annual Report to learn more about our innovative and high-impact work for libraries of all types and our approach to building partnerships and acting in coalition with other organizations. Our core mission is to build voter support for libraries. We can’t wait to keep growing and helping libraries succeed in 2019. With your help as a donor and an ally, we can make it happen together.