Topic 3: Promoting Your Autism-Friendly Library

(You can download this graphic from Libraries and Autism: We're Connected to show that your library is autism-friendly. Click here for complete script to video.)

After creating an autism-friendly library environment and increasing autism awareness among your staff and users, the next step is to promote your library as autism-friendly to your community. One of the reasons people with autism feel excluded from the library is a lack of awareness that the library is a welcoming space for them. Watch this final video clip (1 min) for information on how to promote your library's autism-friendliness:

An easy way to announce your library now considers itself autism friendly is to create and send out a press release (your library may have a process for doing that). Make sure your press release includes:

• Any special training your staff has taken to increase their awareness of autism
• Items in your collection that are autism friendly or that assist those who need more information about ASD
• Programs or services your library offers for people with autism

You can also place a decal in your library's front door or window, post signage in your library, and/or put an announcement on your library's website announcing that you are an autism-friendly library. This can be an important, easy signal to show that people with autism are welcome in the library from the moment they walk in the door.

School librarians might also put an announcement in their school's various communications media to parents and be sure to put something on your school or school library website.

Libraries and Autism: We're Connected has promotional materials available on their website that you can adapt. The Association of Senior Children's and Education Librarians (ASCEL) in the United Kingdom also has Autism Friendly Library resources available on their website, including signage your library can post that informs other users that the library is autism friendly.