The Library’s Educational Role in Bridging the Digital Divide

Abstract

Society has steadily grown more technology-reliant and continues to shift toward digital landscapes for education, business, government, and personal tasks. Alongside these trends there increases a chasm between various privileged and disadvantaged social groups who do or do not have access and knowledge to participate in a digital society. School, public, and academic libraries have an integral role to play in providing both education and access tools to communities to enhance people’s ability to participate in digital activities. By collaborating with each other to decrease the digital divide(s), libraries and social institutions can help to create digitally ethical and responsible participants. This paper explores and compiles existing literature and initiatives regarding the challenges and solutions for libraries aiming to bridge the digital divide(s), what digital literacy and digital citizenship are, and emphasizes the role of educating communities as equally important as providing access to technology.