Municipal council

Knowledge Ontario serves Ontario municipalities by offering digital services that support all residents, no matter their interests or stage of life.

Resource Ontario online databases
Ask Ontario online chat reference help
Learn Ontario teaching digital literacies
Our Ontario online discovery of history, culture and digital collections
Connect Ontario transformation of public library’s online catalogue

Knowledge Ontario and Ontario municipalities

Public libraries in Ontario are primarily funded by municipalities, which provide as much as 80 – 90% of the local library budget through their share of property taxes. It is inevitable that in small, remote and rural communities that library budgets rarely stretch far enough to provide local citizens with the information resources and services found in large urban public libraries. And for the larger centres, it’s often a stretch to meet the diverse needs and demands.

Knowledge Ontario’s digital solutions are offered through public libraries, schools and cultural and post-secondary institutions to connect Ontarians wherever they live, work, study or play online. Our resources create a seamless web of services to follow Ontarians through the various stages of life and learning. Through equitable access to these services, Knowledge Ontario narrows the digital divide and helps municipalities thrive.

Go ahead and boast about Knowledge Ontario in your region. Spread the word. KO adds value and services to every municipality. 

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KO Solutions

Resource Ontario e-resources offer municipalities:

A core suite of trustworthy e-resources that are available to all Ontarians through local public library websites. In many cases, these resources then become available 24/7, from any location with internet access. KO resources add value and service to rural, small, northern, and remote regions. They also serve minority communities, such as First Nations and Franco Ontarians.

Municipalities realize savings through KO’s collaborative efforts, as public libraries do not have to purchase the e-resources we provide. These savings can then be spent on more specialized materials and services.

These same resources are available through the public and Catholic school systems, and colleges and universities across the province:

• A level playing field. Equitable access to resources is an important element of this service. The same core databases are available to every community in Ontario and help bridge the digital divide experienced by rural, remote, northern, French-speaking and Aboriginal communities
• Collaboration. Because the online resources are offered across publicly funded Ontario libraries, clients can access the same resources from home, from school and from work.
• Variety. 09-10 e-resource offerings provide a wide range of topics. There is something of interest to those in every stage of life from teen health and wellness to auto repair to culinary arts resources.
• 24-7 service. From public library websites, anyone with a library card and internet service can access the databases, any time, any day
• Learning help. Many resources are specifically geared to help students
• Currency. Given the economic times, Career Cruising and access to newspapers help job seekers, as well as students thinking about the future

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Our Ontario e-resources offer municipalities:

A chance to tell the world their story! Knowledge Ontario partners with municipalities to preserve and make available the local history collections stored in their libraries, historical societies and museums. Our Ontario provides toolkits, training and web hosting to assist in the digitization of these local resources so that they can be made available over the internet to a world-wide audience.

• Access. The OurOntario.ca site provides Ontarians access to thousands of digital videos, photographs, oral histories, brochures, newspapers, etc…
• Government documents. Easy way to find government documents –over 24,000 government documents of the Legislative Library in one place – govdocs.ourontario.ca
• Spread your local content. Opportunity to make your local content available to your community, to Ontario and beyond
• Cultural preservation for future generations. A way to tell the stories of the past and the present - libraries are interviewing war vets, business people, local leaders and other interesting groups – we can provide the means to tell their stories and make them accessible to all
• Tell Stories. Tools that enable your community to add the stories, details, anecdotes and commentary to photos, letters, documents and more

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Ask Ontario chat service offer municipalities:

A real-time online research and information service! By collaborating with the province’s libraries, and other prominent partners, we can provide personalized research assistance to all Ontarians. The service is especially valuable to municipalities, as it connects disparate communities across the province and provides them with an effective and easy to use resource for community research. The money saved through this service can then be spent on additional library services.

• A way to serve your French-speaking population. The ONdemande service is the French language equivalent of askON and is staffed by bilingual library staff, accessing French language resources.
• Community access. As a shared service, you benefit from the other libraries that participate. When the askON logo says “Open” on your library’s website, your community can be served through online research chat.
• Meeting community needs. The service gives Ontarians access to a valuable resource that can be used anywhere to do research that is pertinent to communities.
• Equitable. AskON is uniquely positioned to provide access to rural and northern communities, and both big and small municipalities.

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Connect Ontario and BiblioCommons offer municipalities:

Connect Ontario's goal is to transform the library catalogue into a rich discovery experience that enables patrons to interact with resources and each other. Library users can browse the new books at the library, review them, and share their lists with others. Tagging is a popular feature that lets library users use keywords to create their own lists for future reference.

BiblioCommons is:

• Involving. Clients bookmark, make reviews, tag favourites and much more
• Attractive
• Fun
• Flexible. Allows clients to log in once for many uses – to participate in contests and promotions and more
• Web 2.0. Features for connecting, communicating, information-sharing, creating your own settings for ease of use.
• Private. Clients include their own privacy settings.

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Learn Ontario's digital literacies offers municipalities:

A unique slate of learning tutorials designed to strengthen digital literacy skills. Although search engines like Google are valuable tools, they do not provide ideal tech support for software or "how-to" user problems. We offer a centralized, easy-to-search collection of tutorials that teach users how to use standard workplace and production software applications, provincially licensed OESS K-12 software, and web 2.0 and social media tool sets.

• 24/7. Anyone can access Learn Ontario’s online resources from its discovery portal at LearnOntario.ca to find the help they need, when they need it.
• Answers. Users can find answers to tech questions and “just-in-time” resources that provide the information they need right when they need them

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