Clinton School grad lauded at kids’ library

When Emily Fischer and her professor in an educational policy seminar first teamed up for her capstone community service project, everyone thought they would be an odd couple.

As it turns out, the pairing wasn’t so bad.

The “highly structured” student at the University of Arkansas Clinton School of Public Service, along with the “highly unstructured” professor, Don Ernst, dreamed up ideas for an interactive children’s library, said Skip Rutherford, the school’s dean.

Voters in 2007 approved a bond issue to build and operate two new libraries, including a children’s library.

In March 2013, the Central Arkansas Library System’s Hillary Rodham Clinton Children’s Library and Learning Center opened on a 6-acre lot at 4800 W. 10th St. in Little Rock with some of Fischer’s ideas incorporated, including a teaching greenhouse.

Almost a year after the library’s opening, some two dozen of Fischer’s family, friends and associates met just outside the library’s greenhouse. There, Clinton School officials dedicated a bench - “a place of reflection” - to the 2010 graduate for her service.

“I’m just so proud,” said Fischer, 29. “I come back every year around this same time. It’s a magical process to see the transformation every year.”

While in Ernst’s class, a book by David Orr - required reading about uniting education and the environment and giving youths a true understanding of how the environment works - resonated with Fischer, she said.From there, she was determined in her final project to incorporate the environment into everyday lives, she said.

Fischer, who now works for the State Department in Washington, D.C., wrote a couple of grants for her final class project, but all were unsuccessful, she said. She graduated before the funding from the 2007 bond issue started seeping in.

But even before then, Fischer and Ernst met with community members, including about 200 children between ages 11 and 17, asking what they wanted out of the library. First and foremost, they wanted a safe place “full of color and light,” Ernst said.

Next, he said, they wanted an area where the children could perform and dance. While sifting through the children’s drawings, Ernst said he noticed a third constant: food hubs, mostly some type of fast-food restaurant.

“The idea is we create this community hub,” Ernst said, adding that in an area considered to lack easy access to fresh food, the children drew “images of hope and possibility.”

Just in the past few days, approximately 30 children planted fresh peas, kale, garlic and lettuce. All the crops will go to community and backyard gardens to help foster development, production and education on growing fresh foods, he said.