Passport Project's mission is to provide exciting educational experiences that build community through the arts, encourage respect for diversity and rejection of racism, and inspire a passion for learning and the global community.

Here’s a fun fact: Cleveland Public Library has been a United Nations Depository library since 1947 and it is recognized as the official UN deposit library for the state of Ohio. The UN Deposit Library System is an important part of the United Nation’s outreach and education effort and consists of over 400 libraries in 140 different countries. This means that the Library receives official UN Documents that are archived in the Social Sciences Department  on the 5th Floor of the Louis Stokes Wing.

Written in 1922, Nella Braddy's Young Folks' Encyclopedia of Etiquette is filled with all kinds of useful knowledge for young folks in the 1920s.

Of course, accepted etiquette changes over time, depending on many factors. For instance, according to this passage entitled "The Child's Rights," it was considered harmful to the child's psyche to brag incessantly about his or her accomplishments in front of the child. Today, such behavior might be construed in a much different way.

The rules of decorum related to dress and modesty have obviously changed since 1922. Check out how a young lady was expected to dress for a day at the beach. Hard to imagine what a similar book would say today.

Visit the Social Sciences Department or click here for a list of titles on etiquette from yesterday and today. 

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Recently staff members from the Cleveland Public Library toured the Cleveland Police Museum to learn how the two organizations could work together to best assist visitors of our respective institutions.  Police Museum curator Allan J. Coates told the group, "The Police Museum is not only a history of the Police Department but of Cleveland itself."

The museum displays artifacts and photos from significant events in Cleveland history, including the emergence of the Cleveland Mafia, Elliot Ness's career as Cleveland Public Safety Director, and the Torso Murders (which Ness was unable to solve).

Click here to read more.

It's that time of the year again when the students of Ohio are preparing to take the Ohio Achievement Tests (OAT) and the Ohio Graduation Tests.  Achievement tests are currently administered in grades 3 to 8.  Each test consists of five sections: reading, writing, math, social studies, and science.  The Ohio Graduation Tests have replaced the Ohio Ninth-Grade Proficiency Tests, effective with the graduating class of 2007.   Click to read Frequently Asked Questions provided by the Ohio Department of Education as well as, links and resources available at Cleveland Public Library, Social Sciences Department.

 

Cleveland Public Library’s baseball collection in the Social Sciences Department includes many early baseball novels. The infancy of American baseball fiction from the Civil War up to 1910 is very well represented in the Library’s collection. The first mention of baseball in fiction is generally credited to Jane Austen, who uses the word in Northanger Abbey:

“[I]t was not very wonderful that Catherine, who had nothing heroic about her, should prefer cricket, base-ball, riding on horseback, and running about the country at the age of fourteen, to books. . . (p.5.)“

Northanger Abbey was drafted during 1797 and 1798, but Jane Austen continued revising and editing it until 1803.  Unfortunately, it was not actually published until 1818.   Cleveland Public Library’s collection includes one nineteenth century edition of Northanger Abbey.

“73.1% of American's describe themselves as soft-hearted”*

Statements such as the one above are derived from the results of opinion polls. Many people in politics, news organizations, and business believe that the use of poll and survey data can effectively gauge the public’s opinion on a particular issue. Others believe that polls and surveys are fundamentally flawed; they are based on the erroneous premise that public opinion is merely an aggregate of individual opinions which can in turn be represented in percentages.

With the election season in full swing public opinion poll results are continuously referenced in the news. Regardless of how we feel about their merit we cannot deny that they have considerable influence on our own opinions. The results of polls and surveys are determined by using various statistical methods that can be difficult to understand. Cleveland Public Library has a wide range of resources that highlight poll and survey results and delve into the different methodologies used in conducting them.

TAKE OUR POLL!

The Social Sciences Department of the Cleveland Public Library routinely receives questions regarding politics and the upcoming 2008 General Election. Below you will find a sample of frequently asked questions and the answers provided by our staff.