So, welcome everyone to Encompass Live. If you are unfamiliar with the show, Encompass Live is the Nebraska Library Commissions Weekly Webinar Show. And we cover everything from pretty much anything library related. School libraries, public libraries, academic, prison special, pretty much everything. So if it is library related, it will probably show up at some point on this show. And it starts every Wednesday at 10 a.m. Central Standard Time. So if you're looking for something to watch, here we are. We also record the show. And yes, Krista, I did press record. You're welcome. And you can, we do host those on YouTube. So you can watch this recording after the show. And I'm going to jump out of Krista's slides. This is what she usually plays right at the start. And I'm going to jump into my presentation for today. So traditionally, if you've gone to a pretty sweet tech show, you know that I usually set up a slide deck. But we're going to do something a little bit different today because it's easier to learn WordPress if you're actually in WordPress. So what I'm going to talk about today is how to actually pretty up your website. You may have actually attended a previous Encompass Live where they talked about auditing your library's website. So if you actually want to find out how to plan out and how to assess your library website, I recommend going to that session because she did an amazing job. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. So this session is going to talk about how to actually like revamp your website layouts, how to just splash it up a little bit. And then another really, really, really, really common question I get is how do I actually set up my library policies so that people can actually navigate them on the page. And that it doesn't just look like, and people are actually able to download and access it more easily. And then the third most common question I get is actually the calendars and events. So I'll do that one first and then I'll do the layouts for kids and teens. And we'll do the designing graphics that work well throughout the entire process because it's just easier to show you as we go. So the first thing that I'm going to go through here and do is talk about the layouts. So I'm going to jump right into WordPress here. And I set up just a really simple training website. So I'm going to jump out and I'll go start fresh from the dashboard where you'd actually go right when you first log into WordPress. And if anyone has any questions about what's covered, you can put it into the question or did the chat section of go to meeting. I'm used to using zoom so I almost just said zoom by default, but you know where you are. And so you can add your questions there, or I'll put my email in at the end so you can also reach out and ask about it later. So I will do my best to keep an eye on all of the different chat stuff, but I'm covering stuff. I'll just ask in between each different thing. So let me move all this over. And so I can keep an eye on everything. And please ignore my luggage in the background I'm packing for a trip. So I'm on the pages section here, and I'm going to add a new page in here. And I'll show you two or three different ways that you can use an alternative layout instead of just list on a page. So I'm just going to copy and paste a really a list that I've already got. And I'll do use a list block paste. So a lot of you have probably already got this on your website. I have this on my website, but people are getting sick of looking at lists. When people go to what they view as a boring website, they tend to click away. So if you haven't already used it, I use a tool called Elementor. Elementor is actually a plugin for WordPress that lets you build out fancier layouts. You can do a lot with the regular Gutenberg editor, but Elementor is actually a free plugin that you can download. It has today I'll be using only the free features. So I'll click on this. Yes, I want to leave the page. I'll click on this. And then if you don't already have it, you can go to the plugin sections of WordPress, search for Elementor, download the free version. And if you really, really, really want the fancy stuff, they also have a pro version. So if you want more control over your, like the gallery settings, or if you want more control over being able to add in pages and posts and different custom places, then this is the way to go. So by default, Elementor will open up to this main section where it gives you all the different block types on this left hand side. And this is, if you already had anything typed into your page or entered onto your page, it's going to convert it into Elementor friendly blocks. So this is your heading, this is like the title that'll show up on the top of the page. And this is your actual list. So I'm going to add in a new section down here. And I'm going to use this three column layout because what we're going to do is add in three different image cards on here that has the description underneath. So when you click on this page and this little plus sign here, you'll go over onto this left hand side, and you're looking for something called image box. So we'll grab this, we'll just click and drag this over into this little box. And then you want to grab the most common things that people use this for is to showcase upcoming events and featured materials and featured resources. So this is 101 class. And then you can enter in a brief description. And the date, I'll actually choose somewhere in February so it doesn't seem like it's already passed 24. So one thing in Elementor and in WordPress in general is that by default, even if you do a line break in like right after this, like you're trying to get this to slash four slash 2024 to go on to a new line. It won't actually do it. If you just use this regular trying to put a line break in here. They actually make you use something called H list HTML tag. So if you just do this be like the BR and then the slash and your brackets, it'll push it on to a new line. And if you want an extra space, you can do two of those. But that's just a little trick of the trade. So if you've been super frustrated by why that won't work if you're using Gutenberg or if you're using Elementor. That's why it's because it's just looking for that. And if you don't have, if you have no idea what that BR is and you don't remember it after this show, you can also just add in a separate text underneath it. So you can add a new text editor right down below. And you can add it in here. So that way if you forgot that little trick or if it's not showing up right for you, you can still do it. And then you can center it by going into style and center. So that way everything lines up the way that you want it to. And the other thing that you want to do with this little icon thing is that you actually might want to make it look cool. Even if you don't have a picture of a business class going on at your library, you can also go to a website called Pixabay. And this is a, this is the place where I get a lot of my images for websites and for the use on the web. And I'm just going to grab, I'm going to search business. I'm a librarian. What do I know. So I'm going to grab this cool looking image. Actually, that's kind of a trick question because I've been researching and learning a lot about businesses so I actually know quite a bit. So, whatever. But I'm just going to download this. And I'm going to download it at the highest resolution possible. And the reason that I didn't go to this highest highest one is because usually when you try to download the highest resolution it'll ask you to log in. And I can't guarantee I remember my password right now so I'm going to play it safe. So I downloaded this. Now I'm going to go to upload file. I'll go to select file, grab this image that I just uploaded and waiting, waiting, waiting.  And now you'll see that it shows up as this tiny, tiny, tiny, tiny little thumbnail. We're going to change this image size to large. And so now if that doesn't do the trick, you want to go into style. Go to width and drag this all the way to 100. So this is how you actually get that to fill that entire screen. And now you might want to actually change the distance here. So we're going to go to spacing up here and shift that down. And you can also go into this column section and say edit column. And you can even add any background colors and styling. So if you want to be able to change the blocking on each one of these different columns, you'll go into style background type. And then you'll click on this little color that has a little slash through it. Now I'm just going to choose a really neutral color just to show what this looks like.  You can fiddle with whatever color you want on here. It's your website. And then you can do the exact same thing over here. But usually what I do on here is I go to duplicate. And that way I don't have to actually do this entire mess again. And I'm going to drag this up here. So now I don't have to change my settings. I don't have to do anything. And I just have to change the background color of this column here. So I aim for this little, I hover over this column. Wait for this little column thing to show up here. Go into the style section on the left hand side. Go to the background type. Go to classic. Hit the little slash thing over here. And now I'm just going to choose a cool teal color because why not. And now you'll see that depending on the color that you chose, sometimes you'll also need to change the color of this title, because that's not going to pass a readability test by any stretch of the imagination. So I click back into this section here. Go back into style and go into content. And then I can change the color of this title by clicking on the title color. And I'm just going to go a hair above black. And then I'll change the color of the paragraph. So that's easier to read. And I'll also make it matching here. So I'll copy this highlight copy. Go back into this original one. Go into the content setting under the style section. And then I'll click on the color for the description and paste the exact same. This is a hex color code. So this is a number code that indicates the color on a website. Just basically. And then I'll change this. We want this to be the exact same thing as this heading color. And honestly, with a nearly black, you could probably almost eyeball it, but I have like OCD styling. So I'm going to copy. And so I copied the hex color from this title. I go over to this title just by clicking on it. And then I grab this title color and paste in the same title color over here. And you can also add a handy dandy little button. So I'm going to click. I don't know why Elementor set it up in this way, but they made it kind of random to be able to add these secondary little columns. So you actually have to click on the plus sign of a column you have not yet filled. And then the button availability will actually show up. And then you can grab a button and click and drag it over. And you want to drag it over toward. Come on. You're aiming for what I'm looking for is this little rectangle to show up when the rectangle shows up and this little. Circle cross thing that says that I can't put it there when that disappears. And this rectangle shows up. I can plunk my button down. If you try to just grab a button and plunk it. Where that where you want it to go, but where that little slash thing is not is still showing up. It's not going to appear. So you just want to make wait for that. And then you can click on your new button and then change the settings on the left hand side here. So where it says click here, you can say register. And then you can send it, you can copy and paste a link to a Google form or wherever your forms are showing up into this link section. And so I'll just grab a random. Google form. We'll just send people over to the tech kit request form. I'll delete it anyway. No one's ever going to click on this. They don't even know it exists. So I will get a prefilled link. Now it's copied. Now I'll go back into my Elementor page. And it did not copy. So I'm going to send. Grab a link short in the URL just because I can get copy. That time it copied to clipboard. I'll go back into Elementor and now control V paste link options. I'm going to open it in a new window. And then I'll close the little options by clicking on the gear. Now I want my button to be centered in my area. So we'll hit the center here. I don't love this color because it doesn't not match. It's just not what I'm going for. So I want to change this green. So I'm going to go into style, go into color. And let's just make it like a darkish gray. There. I could also OCD it and I could grab the same color from the text, but it's a button. It's a test. You can do it if you want to. And we'll also change this business 101 class to a knitting club. And then we'll change this picture. We'll go back into content. Go to choose image. And now I'm going to grab a knitting picture. So what I'm trying to do is I'm going to get as close as I can to the pixels that I chose here. If I really wanted to, I could actually go into Canva and I could make sure that all my image tiles were the same size. And you'll see why I do that in a second. So let's just grab a random knitting. Oh, this one's cute. Download. It's not exactly the same size, but whatever. So now I'm going to go back into Elementor and I will upload the file that I just downloaded, click on select file, grab my little knit bears. Open and go to insert media. So now the, it's not as noticeable as you'll find in some of the other images that you might choose. But if you have web styling OCD like I do, you might want all of these to actually match and line up all the way across. And if you scooch in here, they don't. This is actually a taller picture than this one is. So it's just something that catches people's eye when they see it and when they're trying to find out what you've got going on. And the average user might not notice it, but. But I know it's there. It just looks more pleasing if it, it all matches. So I'm going to copy this one more time. And I will copy and paste. Now that grab the entire thing. So I'm just going to delete this column. And so I'll right click and delete. So now that's another way that you can make it so that if you want the same coloring, you can just keep it as is. It looks like a homogenous block. So I'm just going to edit this column and I'll grab.  I'll grab a new random color. Let's do purple. So if you are looking for a cool trick to actually get colors that match, you can also go to a website called coolers.co. If you are terrible at matching colors like I am, you go to this website, click on start the generator. And then you'll click on the space bar. I actually kind of like this green. I have my favorite animals a frog and my first frog was like a bright green. I like green. I locked in this color. And then I'm going to hit the space bar until I find more colors that I like. And just for sake of having different colors, I'll lock in pink. And then I will lock in blue. So if you do have library branded colors, you can also type in your code here. So you can type in the specific color code, and then you can lock that one in and match based on that. So, and you can also, if you have your own color code, you probably might not even need this site. But sometimes you will need other colors on your website that are complimentary to the colors that are on your brand, but aren't exactly like you might want different shade differentiation. And you can also grab that from here. So say that this is a library branded blue, you can also go into view shades, and you can grab hex colors that are lighter or darker. So fun fact. And the way that you'd use this is to just, there's a copy hex button that's just like short coded into here. So you copy the hex, and then you can go back into Elementor. We'll go back into this column section. And I'll go back to my color, and I can paste in that hex that actually worked. It's really super similar to the one that I already chose. This is probably a poor example. But you get the gist of it. I can do it better with this. I'll change purple to pink. So you have a better feeling of how that actually changed. So you probably already got it. Then I'll just click on that little column thing up here, go into the color. And we're pink. So now the other thing that you might want to do is this is assuming that you just had like a list of events that are coming up. I'm not going to go through the entire process of changing this title and changing the description and changing the picture because you know how to do that now. And you already know how to pretty much duplicate that layout. So if you have multiple images, you can, there's this little section up here when you hover over it. That will say edit section. You can also right click on that and duplicate it. So this will duplicate your entire block. And so you don't have to do this over and over and over again if you have entire rows and rows of stuff that you want to add in, you just duplicate it. And if you want to have some sort of, if you don't like it that these are all smushed together. You can also click on this edit, this edit content, this edit section area, and you can put in spacing. So you can also do style. And it's an advanced never mind. So we're going to go to padding, but we're going to we're going to unlink these will go to padding on top. And give that a little bit more breathing room. And you can slide it. I don't care how much padding you give it usually I do about between 20 and 30. So we'll go to 25. And you can also change it so that this will click on this edit section. It's defaulted to go into boxed. You can also go to full width, and it will take up more space on the page. And we'll go down to this one, go to edit section, go to layout and full width. So now this is taking up the full width of the section that you allowed it. And you can also remove the sidebar. So if you want this to fill up the entire width of the screen like it looks and a lot of social media platforms. Then you can also go into this settings button in the lower left hand corner. And we're going to wait for that to load. This page layout instead of default will go to elementary full width. Give it a second to load take effect. And while it does that I will sit my coffee. And now it stretches across the entire screen. And that's up to you depends on what you're doing. You can do whatever you want with it. So just adding a image and adding a description makes it look cooler than just a list on a page. And you can just grab the picture from Pixabay or whatever you've got stored locally. And it just, it looks way cooler. Maybe it's a me thing. So that is one option for it. But if you don't like this kind of card style layout. You can also add spacing in between these different blocks by clicking on this column. And then we'll go into advanced here. And now we're going to keep this padding linked. And then we're going to add in. This is just going to the picture. I miss clicked, which sometimes happens in here. So you want this edit column, I accidentally hit the picture, and I was aiming for this little button in the corner that says edit column. So now try that again. Confounded. Okay, there's another way we can do it. So edit section. And we'll go to advanced. And we'll hit padding here. So that'll pad the entire section. And you'll see that it also pads the picture in here. We'll click back on here. Go into advanced. And click here. So this is one of those things where I just used about four different software systems. And I have to remember the right setting that's in this software. That is not the other one. So what I'm aiming to do is actually just adding on each add padding on each one of these different little columns. And the setting that usually does it in another program does not do it here. And until I find out why that is, it will not lead you astray. So I'm going to change the padding back here. And change the padding back here. That doesn't make any sense. It was already on zero, but whatever. So let me go into edit. See the edit image box, it usually only edits just this picture here. And the edit column box is supposed to edit everything that's contained within this column. So usually I can just click on that edit column, go into the advanced and add padding that goes around the entire thing. There now it did it. What I was looking for is for it to add the space around the entire block instead of just the image. There are times the charm. So just make sure that you aim for this little column thing. And you can add in padding. I have no idea why I chose 17. I did on the first one and I was too lazy to go back and change them all. Usually I do between 15 and 20, but 17. I'll take it. And so that's your option there. And then we'll go down here. And I'm going to add a new column in here and I'll show you another way that you can do list style stuff without using that card layout. So we'll go into columns. I'm going to choose four columns this time. I'll go into now we've got our plus sign here. I'll click on this first plus. And now I am looking for icon box here. So I'll click and drag the icon box. This time I don't even want this. Let's say that you're doing a library services page. And you want people to know that you have computers. Then you have we're going to duplicate. I'll grab this over here. And you want them to know that you've got a color printer. And then I'll duplicate. You can also copy paste. There's always more than one way to do it. And then I'll change this to say a laser cutter. And then I'll do one more road just to kind of give the full feel of it here. I'll copy paste it just for you. And now I want to change this little icon on top here. So that and I usually just grab a default one that's already loaded in here. So there's already an icon library that's in here that you can grab pretty much anything that already exists. So I usually by default start by searching out what I'm actually want. So I try computer or whatever. But it looks like that is not immediately available. So we're going to grab the next closest thing. I'll use this little file thing. And I'll grab, I'll click on this next one. Go into icon library. And normally I would tell you that you can just upload what you want into this icon. But there's I also chose this setting to show you a weird weird security thing that's in WordPress. And it's because it gives you the option to upload an icon, but it will ask you to upload an SVG icon. And an SVG has a different upload protocol to go into WordPress. So if you upload an SVG, you have to change a security setting on the back end of WordPress that lets you upload different kinds of files. And SVG has kind of like a known security risk for people being able to get hacked more easily. So that's why I say that you can upload your own. You can have an SVG, but do so warily and make sure you have a good IT department, because I don't know how many people know that about WordPress, but it's a thing. My brother is a software engineer, so he told me about it. But so I usually just, if you're short on time using this icon library, people mostly just look at the captions of it to see what it is and they want to know that. They just want to know what you've got. So I'll show you this icon area to do it. I'm going to grab just this little, we are going on printers. So we'll grab this print. And then a laser cutter, we're probably not going to find a tiny little laser cutter, but this is a demonstration. So I'm just going to grab whatever looks cool, like this little leaf. Insert and keep this as a star. Click here and go to them, then we'll do 3D printer. But again, you can use whatever you want. You can also do the exact same thing that we did with these up here and change the color settings. And you can also change the size of it. So if you want to make this bigger. You can make it massive. And I usually just kind of defaulted to around around 100. But it really depends on what you're doing. You can do whatever you want. And then we'll go into content and then go into the color of you can change this to that dark gray, you can change it to pretty much whatever you want. And you can go into this coolers and grab a cool color that you really like. And then you can also change the typography. So that's defaulted to Roboto, but you can change it to pretty much anything you want on here. And one thing that I will note about this is that sometimes even though this font is available on your own computer and in this setting, it may not always appear that the way that you want it to on your library customers computer, because the font that's available to show up is also determined by the browser that they're using and the type of computer that they're on. So you might choose this cool, cool, fancy font, but on the back end of this, it might just what the computer has to do is actually list out a whole bunch of different fonts that say, First, use rock salt. If the computer doesn't have rock salt available, then go to Ropa sands. If Ropa sands and rock salt aren't available, then go to blah, blah, blah. So you might actually just wind up with aerial font no matter what you do. But this is just a cool way to most computers most modern computers will probably be able to display the font that you want. But most of our patrons, I won't say most, a lot of our patrons might not have a modern computer. They might not have the most updated cool new tech. So you might think that you're choosing this cool, fancy font. Some people aren't ever going to see it. So I usually just say use the either use the default or use one of the more common fonts that are available, even if you just Google common fonts. And so then we'll click on here and we can change the color of You can change anything. We'll go back into content. And you can also change the size of your little caption. And I'm waiting for my computer to load here. So we'll go back into style, and then we'll go into content. And then we'll go into typography. And then we'll go into size. So that is what makes it bigger. And I don't want it too massive. We're just going to go to about 30. And you're welcome to just test around and play with these different settings, but I'm lazy. I usually just do default when I can. Now I'm just fiddling with it. All right, so now we'll click back on here and go back into scroll back up to the top, go to the icon section. And this is actually I'm used to it now like it's second nature to me now. But one thing that it took some getting used to was that they separate the settings for icon versus content. So it took me a second to actually realize that you could change the colors of the content to and you could change the colors of the icon. Because by default, it opened up this and it took me a second to notice this but you can totally do it. So just make sure you click through both of them and play around with what you got. So I'm going to change this color content to computers, you can make a different color for each different one of them. You can make them all the same color out care. And now I'm going to copy and paste this and delete that. So usually when you get your setting done on one of them and you have one of them looking the way that you want, you just copy and paste the whole mess. For whatever reason I decided to put all the icons up before it actually made them look the size and shape that I wanted, but learn from my mistakes. Wait until you're done. So now delete this delete this copy paste paste. Then you can go through change your icons change what they say. And duplicate them. So now I just went to that little I hovered over this edit section right click and duplicated. And you can have as many of these in a row as you want. And you can also add in a heading. So I'll hit this little plus sign here that says add section. I'll add this section here. Go to a full with section so that it fills up the entire column. I'll click on that plus sign that's in that new section drag over a heading. And we'll see that it says computer lab and maker space. Now I want to make this big. So I'm going to take this here. I will center it. And then I'll make it a larger font. Then I'll go to this style. And I'm going to change the text color to a white ish because we're going to add a background. Then I'll go into this advanced will go into background. Now I'm going to go into this little classic for the background type. And we're going to add a background color by clicking on this little square with the slash through it. Now, I've been on a blue or an on an aqua kick so we're just going to do that. And I'm just going to grab a little there. So now you'll see that this is smushed in real close to the actual text. So we want to go back into this advanced. And we're going to go up into layout. And now we're going to add some padding. So now this is going to look at more like a blocked off section. So I'm just going to grab 30 just because I can. And now the other thing is that you might want this to line up to the other blocks on here because this looks a little bit random with it being smushed off into the middle. So we'll go back into this edit section. And we're going to change it from the default that is boxed over to full width. And now it's not going to be perfectly full width because we added that padding onto it. So you did want it to be perfectly lined up and you have your own kind of styling OCD like I have my styling OCD. You can go into this click on this section here, and you can go unlink the values, and you can shift this down to zero. You can also type in it. Double zero, zero, tab, tab, zero. And now that will actually get it closer to the edge. And you can also I have led you astray. I'm going to ship this back into 30 because I went into the wrong. So I'll show you what I did wrong here just because it's one of the easiest things that people can do wrong. And it's because this padding here is actually what makes the empty space on the outside of this of this text. So when I change that 30, all it did was change this little block around here. And what I wanted to do was change that empty space that's on the outside here. And that's in a different setting. So you click inside the box and the advanced and the padding has the 30s on the inside. We want to click on this little edit section here, go into the advanced and now our padding is defaulted. So we want to unlink this. And now we want to go to this right. And we're doing a negative padding. There must be an override on here. So in the back end of the computer, whenever you do styling choices, the computer has to say pay attention to the settings there in this section first. If it doesn't conflict with the settings in this section, then follow the settings in this section next. So there's like a little background thing in the computer says that we can't do this. So an easier way to do this is to go into the edit section here and then go into the advanced and add padding around this entire section so that it lines up. And the reason that that isn't doing that is because we're going to set this down to zero, link all these values together so that it affects everything on the other side. I forgot that I had unlinked it before. Now we can change it to match. So it's actually easier to get this section to match this one than it is to get that section to match this one. So cool. Now, because I'm used to crystal like running the show in the background, I haven't actually gone into check to see if there are any questions. And I did do see a question that says can you show how to edit the image so they line up I'm assuming that you mean the like the image that's over the business one on one class the knitting club and then whatever in the world this is going to be. So, yes, I can. What I'm going to do is go into Canva. And I will grab a just a random template. And normally what I do is I just choose a common pixel size. So, I'm going to grab. So the most common setting for a. I usually do this, I grab a calculator. And I know I check the setting with of the actual layout that I'm using. Usually it's going to be about 1280 pixels wide. And then I divide that by three sections. And three is the number of columns that I want to be going across. So I know that if I wanted no absolutely no space in between each different image, each one each image would need to be about 426 pixels wide. And, but I want there to be a little bit of space on the sides. So about 400 is fine. If your OCD style, you can do it that way and you'll have absolute control over the size of your picture. But the way that I usually do it when I'm just lazy or the way that most people do it is to just grab a picture that is larger. The larger pictures are the right size and then WordPress will automatically shrink them down. So, you just want to make sure that you're choosing the same size pictures and Pixabay does not do a great job of having the same exact size pictures. So I'm going to go into the reason that I did the search for the pixel is that I wanted to set a default canvas size in Canva. And I wanted to make sure I chose a random pixel that was bigger than what I actually needed. So I'm going to go into create a design and a custom size. And I'm going to randomly choose 600 for a width, and then I will use 300 for a height. So now I have a standardized template. Now I'm going to go into the apps in Canva. And Canva actually has an integration with Pixabay. So I'm going to search for Pixabay in Canva. And then I'll open the Pixabay app inside Canva. And then I'm going to search for business. And usually I can find like a similar or the exact same image that as the one that I found in the regular website of Pixabay. If you can't, don't worry about it. This is in this case, we were actually able to find it. So now I just click and drag that over. And now I'm going to duplicate this page. And now I'm going to grab knitting. And this is a cool one. Well, we'll grab the bears we used before. So now I'll drag this over there. This is close enough. If you really want, you can fiddle around with where this is cropped off, but we're not going to worry about that. And now let's say that we want our last image to be Story Hour. So we have kids reading. So let's say that these are the three images that we want to use in our On our website on Canva. If you don't already know, you can also upload your own images and then drag them over here. Our main thing is that we're just cropping these images so that they're all the same size. So now I'm going to go into the share button and I'm going to hit download. And then the fun thing about Canva is that if you have the paid version, you can also drag this to a higher pixel size. And this is just like kind of a safety marker. So that if you are only considering that you want a three column layout, but you're not sure. You can make this extra big.  When this when wordpress automatically stretches your image to a bigger size, it won't look grainy and pixelated because you already chose a higher quality, higher size image at the start. But the thing that you if you choose to do this make sure that you magnify every one of the images that you download to the exact same size. And that way you won't have to worry about things stretching out weird. So I'm going to make a note that we're using a 1.5 scaling. And now I'm going to grab image one done download. You can also bulk download them but it zips the files. And then you just have to unzip them. So share download 1.5 page to done download. Do the same thing again share download pages page three. If you have a million of them, feel free to just download them all and unzip them later. Download there. And now we go back into Elementor. We're going to delete, delete control Z because I didn't do what I wanted it to do. We're going to click back on this image, click on upload files, click select file. I'm going to grab this newly updated. I don't feel like uploading these all individually so I'm just going to upload them all in one. So then I'll grab waiting for this to load. I'm waiting for this bottom right hand corner insert media to show up. So then we have this. Now I'm going to grab our new bears. And now it's just in media library because I had already done it. And then I'll click on this last one, which is going to be our children's story hour. Grab her Harry potters. And now they all line up. And because we grabbed that. Because we made the images bigger, if we decide that we don't want to use this knitting club one in the middle. We can also delete this. We're going to click the entire column. And now it'll stretch out. So now we don't have to worry about accidentally starting with a smaller image and then when it stretches, it looks weird. So that's what we do that. Hopefully that helped. And we're going to, I'm going to close some of these different tabs because we don't really need them anymore. And I'm also noticing that we're creeping up on 1059, but I'm going to go back into our list here. So we covered the layouts that look different than a simple list we covered the graphics. And in a weird way, we actually covered the some one of the event page layouts, because one of the most common event page layouts is to actually just make it look like this and have a direct registration button. And the other way that you can do it is to just set up a calendar. And the main thing that I wanted to go over in this webinar was the recommended calendar type. So I'm going to publish this just for example. And I'm going to wait for this little spinning circle to go. Then I'll go into this upper left and go into exit so we can get back into our main WordPress dashboard. The other main question that I get both from Nebraska libraries and from libraries that are using WordPress outside Nebraska that are trying to figure this stuff out is which events plug-in should I actually use to make things look the way that I want it to. And we actually use events manager. Events manager has this icon that looks like a little shield. And there's also about there are a lot of different plugins that have very similar sounding names. So you just want to make sure that you're grabbing event manager and not event managers. And the reason that I use this is because it has a freemium version that has all the different features that I'm looking for. So it allows you to add a single one time event and it allows you to add recurring events. So if you have a story hour that happens the second Tuesday of every month, then you can just fill out a form that says this happens the second Tuesday of every month and it'll automatically put it into your calendar. There's a lot of the other calendars on the market. They put the recurring events either in the paid or they just don't have that option. So that's why I use it. And then the other thing is how to set up the layouts for the kids and teens. And we also sort of covered that just because most kids and teens want something that just looks like Twitter or looks like a social media feed. So you can also use that same column layout to be able to do that. And your other option is that I showed how to do the columns that are straight across in a row. But you can also use that same column layout to make offset tiles. So we're unfortunately we are out of time a little bit for that right now. But if you want, you can also email me I did promise that I would give you the email address. I'm used to having a slide deck that actually has it right there. So what I'm going to do is put it in here. Why did I hit enter. I didn't mean to hit enter here. I have another way to do it.  There you go. So I'll give you a second to jot that down. If you do have any other pressing questions, you can enter them into the chat.  If it's something that's going to take a little bit longer or needs a longer demonstration. For Nebraska libraries, I do a. You can sign up for a time that you can do a WordPress orientation or you can just sign up for a time that you want to learn one specific feature or like a few specific things. So if you say, can you show me that offset layout will set up kind of a time to get to hop over zoom or on the phone and it'll walk you through how to do it. If you are looking for different ways to do the policies because we didn't get to that today. I can show you how to do that. And you have options. And if you are a library outside of Nebraska, I'm already answering the questions feel free to email me and I'll still answer it. And if you are looking for future and compass live shows, you can go to. You can just Google and compass live as crystal always says right now, we're the only one that uses the end compass live. So don't use it. Don't you dare take it. But right now if you Google it, you'll find this list it'll take you to the web page and the upcoming shows. So we have got Wi-Fi in the library coming up next and then we have connected Nebraska bridging the digital divide their innovative at a Rome expansion I can't believe I actually said that all right. And then we've got a few more shows coming up and we have another pretty sweet tech which is the monthly show that I do the last Wednesday of the month. So if you're looking for a techie goodness of some flavor. This today was WordPress I've also done stuff for like augmented reality AI and I do stuff. So, feel free to register for any of those shows you can also follow it on Facebook and I think that I'll just say Facebook I'm 99% certain it's on Twitter too but I know it's on Facebook. So hopefully we see you at a future show and I am going to stop the recording now.


The Appalachian Center for the Arts is offering free improv classes to ring in the new year beginning on January 16th. Anyone 18 years or older can sign up for two weeks of classes that end with an improv show on January 26th. No acting experience is required and sign-ups are available at theapparts.org. We're going to have six days of rehearsal or practice, the 16th, 17th, and 18th in the 23rd, 24th, and 25th with a show on the 26th at 7.30 to 9 p.m. Yeah, and it will culminate in one big show and it's kind of like the peach bombs last year but it's going to be just a little bit different. We already have our name, we're the Country Bumpkins for this round under the banner of improv at the app. The Country Bumpkins have been doing a lot of work this past year with classes and and getting everything ready and and they're really ready to share their stuff. Make your ride one of a kind and see the experts at J&M Custom Auto and off-road. It's your customization candy store. Visit jmcustomauto.com and select your making model. It's that easy. Window chaining, remote starts, leather interiors, sound systems, front and rear bumpers, spray and bed liners, bed covers, wheels and tires, lift kits, step rails, even underglow like kits and so much more. If you can dream it, we can do it at J&M Custom. Learning improv can also help with social, team building and communication skills. Ward says he is looking forward to meeting and working with new students. Social, communication, interaction, team building, all these skills that are foundational, not only in the professional world but our personal lives are really honed in during an improv session or improv class. You know new students, new people or even experienced people coming in, you know we're able to not fall into the same pitfalls you know that some actors or improvisers may have and we're able to build on a really solid foundation of improvisation, yes and learning with the team dynamic as opposed to I've got to learn my lines, I've got to do this by myself. We have a family, we have a community here. Reporting from Outantop News, I'm Nick Colum.


Personal finance practice problem using OneNote. Stock split versus stock dividend. Prepare to get financially fit by practicing personal finance. You're not required to, but if you have access to OneNote would like to follow along icon left-hand side practice problems tab in the 12 to 70 stock split versus stock dividends tab. Also take a look at the immersive reader tool the practice problems typically in the text area too with the same name, same number, but with transcripts, transcripts that can be translated into multiple languages either listened to or read in them. We're thinking about investments in stocks, stocks representing an ownership interest in a corporation. Corporations being separate legal entities whose ownership interest is broken out into standardized units or shares or stocks. We're also typically thinking about corporations that are publicly traded corporations, those trading on public exchanges allowing more transparency and access to individual investors, two things such as the financial statements of the corporation on which we can make decisions. Also keep in mind, if you're using investment tools like mutual funds and ETFs, your strategy may be different than if you're investing in individual stocks. When investing in individual stocks we might be drilling down to the trends and to the financial statements of the particular stock itself as opposed to with the mutual funds we might be focusing more in towards sections of the market for example. We're thinking about individual stocks here and investment, what would be the impact if we had a stock split or a stock dividend. So these are two different things that can have an impact on our holdings for example, for the investment. So let's look at it and we're gonna try to consider it from the company side of things to understand what is happening, why it's happening and what's gonna happen to our side of things on the investment. So first let's just consider the balance sheet of a company. So we just put together a balance sheet here imagining that we are investing have some stocks of this company. So they've got the assets, they got the liabilities, they got the equity. We're focused down here on the equity type of side of things. So the typical balance sheet the assets represent what the company has the liabilities represent the company owning something to third parties like a bank. The equity represents the ownership interest for the individuals. You could think about this a couple of different ways you might say one way to think about it from an accounting standpoint typically the assets what the company owns and the liabilities and the equity represent the who has claimed to those assets either a third party 348,000 plus the equity or the owners 987,000 and that gets us to the total here or we could think of it common from a finance kind of standpoint the net value of the company on a book basis would be the assets 1335000 minus the liabilities the 348000 and that would give us the equity kind of the ownership interest. One way to kind of keep that straight in your mind is to think well if the company liquidated they went out of business for example they went bankrupt for example they could sell all of their assets they could pay off the liabilities then in theory they would have 987,000 left to pay off the owners which are the shareholders and they can pay off the shareholders in accordance to the number of shares or the holdings the standardized units of shares that are distributed and outstanding in the market. Now I say in theory because in practice if they liquidated we don't know how much they're actually gonna get for like the fixed assets because they're on the books at a depreciable amount depreciable cost oftentimes or even if they were on the books for a fair value amount we don't because buildings and stuff are like unique in nature we don't know how much you can actually sell them for so that would be the general ideas that's kind of like the book value if they were to liquidate also note that that's not the actual value of the company when you consider future earnings potential because hopefully they're using those net assets to generate revenue that's why the stock price is gonna be higher than on a per share basis than the just the liquidation of the asset price for example. So what happens if there's a two for one stock split? So let's say there is a stock split if I concentrate on the equity section down here we're gonna say that there's common stock outstanding of the 100,000 shares that's how many shares are outstanding one person might own multiple shares but there's 100,000 shares out there standardized units of ownership we have a par value of $2 the par value does not represent market value or the amount that the stocks was sold for it's just a standardized unit so that if I was to see for example this 200,000 I can back into the number of shares that are outstanding 200,000 divided by two would give us the 100,000 shares for example and because if we use the actual value that they issued them for meaning usually this amount represents kind of the investment of owners in the company meaning they issued shares and they got money for them if we just issue it for the amount of money they got then it's not gonna have a nice even $2 par value because they're gonna issue them for however much money they could get which is not gonna be the same all the way through so sometimes oftentimes you see this par value and then you see the capital in excess of par that's how much they sold or issued the stocks over and above the par value so these two numbers on a balance sheet represent kind of like the owner investment in the company and that happens in a corporation with the corporation issuing stocks the initial public offering not the secondary market where most stocks are traded we usually buy from the secondary market these are issued from the company themselves they received most likely cash and they then increased these amounts the par value and the capital in excess of par so these are kind of like the investment the retained earnings represents the earnings of the company the company has generated earnings rolling through the income statement and then they roll into the balance sheet that they have not yet distributed or given back to the owners in the form of dividends because possibly they're keeping them they're holding onto them to buy more fixed assets for example which hopefully will increase the value of the company hopefully allowing for future revenue generation which means it should be reflected in the stock price hopefully but that's the retained earnings and then here's the total equity now what happens in a split if we own the stocks there's a couple of things that we're gonna be concerned about with the split we're gonna be concerned about well how many stocks am I gonna have after the split happens and what's gonna happen to my like percent ownership value after the stock split happens from the corporation side of things they might do a stock split when they're trying to possibly lower the stock price now the stock price is fairly low right now but if they were trying to lower the stock price they might do a stock split why would they wanna lower the stock price maybe if this was higher than what people could typically purchase for and they wanna lower it just they think that might increase the value in the stock just because the stock happens to be in a more price range that people like to buy at that might be one reason they wanna do a stock split so that shouldn't in theory have any impact really on us on the holdings side of things in theory right so what would happen on the company side of things is basically the capital amounts here would go up in shares from 100,000 to 200,000 but the par value would generally be cut in half so notice there's no net impact to this par value of the 200,000 so it's just kind of and then down here the capital in excess of par is still gonna be the 100,000 so notice they didn't issue new stocks there's no increase in the cash there's no increase in the liabilities they just basically adjusted the number of shares doubling the number of shares but cutting the par value in half so no change really on the totals of the balance sheet now this doesn't have any direct impact on the stock price because the stock price is driven by supply and demand but you would expect that if you had two 100,000 shares a day ago and now they just issued and announced a stock split to have 200,000 the stock price the market would reflect that and have the price meaning the stock price would most likely go from $12 down to $6 because the market would have that information would take that into consideration now again you could get an increase in the stock price because if they like the stock split if the market thinks that the price is more reasonable where the split happened and the split is typically often a good indicating sign it could increase the price relative more than six or something like that but you would expect in theory that the stock price would then go to having the stock price so there would be no impact to us then if we owned say if we own like 200 shares of this particular company then we would say 200 times two we would now have 400 shares but the 400 shares we would expect not to be worth $12 but would now be worth $6 so if I had 200 shares before times $12 I had a value of 2,400 and now I've got 400 shares times $6 which would be valued at the same 200, 400 in theory no change in my holdings although when I sell the stock I have a bit more complexity I have to deal with because now I've got a situation where when I bought the stocks I bought them at the full price and now I've got twice as many stocks that should be half of that so I gotta calculate the gain on that which could be a little bit confusing hopefully your broker can help you deal with those stock splits but that's the general idea now the other thing you could be concerned with as an investor is to say what if I have a significant impact on the workings of the company because I own a lot of shares meaning most of us don't so if I own like five shares out of 100,000 shares outstanding then I've got a pretty low percent ownership so it's not like I'm really impacting the decision-making process or I have a big sway on the board of directors for example but if I did if I had like 100,000 times 10% if I had 10,000 shares before then I might want that's gonna be a 10% interest that's a pretty significant chunk of ownership which means I have a lot of influence on who's gonna be elected for the board of directors and stuff for example so if I was significant then I could say well what would happen if I multiply this times two times two then I'd have 20,000 and there would be 200,000 shares outstanding divided by 200,000 I should be at that same 10% so I shouldn't have any real impact there either now we also then have the stock dividend situation so a stock dividend situation means that they're actually giving you value in the form of a dividend a dividend represents a distribution out of the retained earnings normally that's and the retained earnings represents the income of the company that has accumulated over time that they're gonna now give out in a dividend that's similar to a draw for a partnership or sole proprietorship but the dividend has to be even for all owners usually the dividends, a cash dividend so it comes out of cash that would be a decrease to the retained earnings decrease of the cash we on the investment side would get the cash but now they're gonna try to give a dividend of value giving something other than cash giving you stocks so let's say they gave a 10% dividend so if we consider what happens we're not gonna have any change once again to the assets or the liabilities but there's gonna be a little bit different of a change in the equity the thing we need to consider is the retained earnings it's gonna be coming out of then the retained earnings here so this will get a little bit technical on it but the general idea we have the same concerns on our side what's gonna be happening what value are we getting and what's gonna happen to our percent ownership shares for example on the company side of things they're gonna say okay we have in retained earnings the $687,000 we're gonna give out a dividend which we think is currently valued at $12 we know what it's valued at because that's what it's currently trading for so before we issued the dividend we had 100,000 shares so 100,000 we're gonna give a dividend times 0.1 so that's gonna be another 10,000 shares that are gonna be issued and we think they're valued according to the market at 12% times 12 that's gonna be 120 that a value that's gonna come out of retained earnings so I'm gonna subtract minus the retained earnings the $687,000 so it's coming out of that retained earnings that's where we get to the retained earnings here and then we're basically allocating the other side to the equity side of things adjusting the number of shares up to 110 now because that's how many shares are outstanding we still have the $2 power value because we're not gonna change the $2 power and that's gonna give us the 220 and the difference then is gonna go into the capital in excess of par so I'll explain that a little bit more in detail but the bottom line is that now retained earnings is impacted because we actually received value as opposed to up here we didn't get a distribution from retained earnings so we kind of have a form of income generally in terms of dividends that we've received not in terms of cash but with the stock dividend on our side on the investment side of things here we shouldn't have any change to our percent ownership generally as well because say we had 200 shares before if I got a 10% dividend times 1.1 110% we would be at 220 after the dividend had been distributed so if I had 200 shares before divided by 100,000 we would have the .002 if I had 200 times 1.1 that would be 220 divided by now I'm gonna have 110 shares divided by 110 shares that's gonna be the same percent so again for small investors we might not be so worried about our voting capacity because it's kind of like voting in a republic as an individual it's quite small but if we had a significant influence in the voting then that's gonna be more important to us let's calculate that in a little bit more detail the new number of shares we're gonna say starting shares are 100,000 we're gonna have a 10% dividend that means 100,000 times 10% 10,000 new shares issued so now we're gonna have shares at 110,000 the new total common stock then it's gonna be the 100,000 plus the 110 that's gonna give us our 110,000 right there the new common stock then we've got the new common the new total common stock is the 110 the par value is just a generic number so it's not what we sold them for it's not the value it's not the market price it's a generic number that's gonna stay constant that's the point, $2 unless we have a split and that's gonna be 220 so that means the 110 shares times the par value is 220 so the new capital in excess of par then is gonna be the stock price of $12 that we're issuing them for because that's the market price minus the par value which has eaten up that's that generic number of $2 gives us a difference of $10 times the 10,000 new shares so there's an increase in the capital in excess of par of the 100,000 that means the difference here is gonna be changed from the capital in excess of par and if we add that to the original balance now the capital in excess of par is 200,000 the retained earnings then was at the 687 that represents the earnings of the corporation that have not been yet distributed which are some of them are being distributed now which is gonna be the 10,000 new shares times the value of the new shares, $12 so we got then $120,000 worth not dollars but value dollars measured worth of value of shares in theory so the retained earnings was at the 687 it's gonna go down by that value that we received not in cash but in shares of 120 to get to the 567,000 and there's the 567,000 there


Systems theory is a set of theoretical concepts used to describe a wide variety of things in terms of a model called a system. To give it context let's talk a bit about its origins. Of course people have been coming up with abstract theories about how the world works for a long time. Some ancient Greeks thought that everything was made of earth, water, fire and air whilst others came to the conclusion that it was the expression of perfect geometric forms. Over the years our theoretical systems have grown into large and sophisticated bodies of knowledge such as philosophy, mathematics and many other areas of theoretical science, although these theoretical frameworks are often limited to relatively specific areas of interest. During the 20th century systems theory emerged as a new theory that draws upon many core concepts within these pre-existing methods to develop a more abstract framework that is designed to be universally applicable to all domains. In order to achieve such general relevance systems theory starts with the abstract concept of a system and then applies this to modelling various different phenomena from biological to social and technical systems. The model of a system can be loosely defined as a set of parts often called elements that form a whole which is referred to as a system. A system exists within an environment and has a boundary that differentiates the systems exterior from its interior. An example of this might be a country interior to which are all the people, institutions and other elements that constitute the nation as an entire system whilst the exterior to its boundary is the international political environment. A system can be either open or isolated. Isolated systems do not interact with their environment but most systems are open meaning that there is an exchange of energy and resources between the system and its environment. The passing of energy or resources from the exterior of the systems boundary to the interior is termed an input whilst the reverse is termed an output. Systems develop or function through the input of energy or resources from their environment. They process this energy by transforming it to create an output. If this output is of some value to its environment it can be termed energy. If on the other hand it is of negative value it may be termed entropy a scientific term for lack of order, disarrangement or in more familiar terms we might call it waste. An early use of this type of model was during the development of the steam engine where scientists and engineers were thinking about the amount of fuel inputted to the engine relative to the power output and heat energy wasted. By using this model they could create a quantifiable ratio between them that we would now term the efficiency of the system. Of course this same reasoning can be applied to a wide variety of phenomena from the processing of energy within a plant cell to the efficiency of a business organization. We can also model systems on various scales thus elements can form part of systems that themselves form part of larger systems and so on. This is termed nesting or encapsulation and helps us to analyze a system on various levels whilst hiding away the underlining complexity. Systems theory explores many other areas such as emergence that raises key questions about the relationship between the parts within a system and the whole. That is how elements can function together or self-organized to create some new and emergent structure as an entirety. Or other areas such as cybernetics that deals with the systems control mechanisms that allow it to adapt and respond to changes within its environment through positive and negative feedback loops. Systems theory has found application within a wide variety of areas forming the foundation for many new subjects such as systems psychology, systems engineering and systems ecology to name but a few all of which place an emphasis upon a more holistic and contextualized approach to understanding the world around us.


For over 242 years, our United States Army has assured allies throughout the world through the great support of our soldiers, our civilians, and our families. I stand here today in Poland with our allies where we are deterring aggression in Europe. So, from our allies, Happy Birthday, Army!


The next item of business is a statement by Kevin Stewart, the busy minister, on ending homelessness together. Actions recommended by the homelessness and rough sleeping action group. The minister will take questions at the end of his statement, so there should be no interventions and interruptions. I call on the minister to make his statement. Ten minutes, please, Mr Stewart. Thank you for the opportunity to set out our ambitious plans for ending homelessness in Scotland following the work of the homelessness and rough sleeping action group. Everyone needs a safe, warm, settled place that they can call home. Home is more than a physical place to live, it's where we have roots and a sense of belonging. Home gives us our sense of wellbeing and it's the starting point for how we interact with our community and the wider world. It is not acceptable in a country like Scotland for people to be rough sleeping or spending extended periods of time and temporary accommodation. We know that the impacts of homelessness on people is devastating. A fact brought home with the publication of a study into the links between health and homelessness last week showing poorer outcomes across the board for people who have experience of homelessness. That is why the First Minister established the homelessness and rough sleeping action group in September last year to recommend the actions and solutions that are needed to eradicate rough sleeping, transform the use of temporary accommodation and end homelessness for good in Scotland. Everybody found to be homeless in Scotland is entitled to settled housing, and most people are provided with it. There has been a 39 per cent fall in homelessness applications since 2008-9, and that is largely due to the innovative and person-centred approach on prevention happening at a local level. Yet too many people struggle to access the accommodation and the services that they need. We need to change how we look at homelessness as a nation. Homelessness is not about fault, it is not something that individuals choose to become. That is why we must do more to ensure that our system works for those who are most vulnerable, recognising the importance of tackling homelessness as a core part of doing right by everyone in our society. I believe that we can end homelessness in Scotland. There will always be those who require emergency housing and support as life's challenging events are thrown at us, but I want to see a homelessness system that makes the experience as brief and as simple as possible. The system itself should provide a safety net for people when they need it in their lives in times of hardship and crisis, but it also supports them to move on and thrive as quickly as possible. The homelessness and rough sleeping action group rose to the challenge that we set them. In November we received their first set of recommendations in addressing rough sleeping over the winter. Those were implemented with £328,000 worth of investment from the Scottish Government and action group members. That enabled targeted support for people who are sleeping rough and helped to get them off the streets and keep them safe during challenging times over one of our co-diswinters ever. That was followed in March by the action group's recommendations on how to end rough sleeping for good. Recommendations on the transformation of temporary accommodation were submitted in May, and today saw the publication of the fourth and final set of recommendations setting out how to end homelessness altogether. The group has worked at a remarkable pace, while still involving and engaging many others in addition to their regular meetings and significant amounts of work undertaken in between. In just nine months, it has produced four reports covering 70 recommendations, which focus relentlessly on making improvements for people threatened with or experiencing homelessness. We have accepted in principle all the recommendations in the direct control of the Scottish Government. In those areas where there are actions for others, for example councils or UK Government, we will urge them to act and match our commitments. In particular, the six final recommendations made on the funding of temporary accommodation will be developed further in partnership with local authorities. In addition, through Glasgow Homeless Network's iWeCan programme, the action group engaged with people who have first-hand experience of homelessness. They know what it is like to navigate the homelessness system and can therefore see where the barriers are. I cannot emphasise enough how important I regard that work. I wish to express my heartfelt thanks and appreciation to John Sparks, as chair of the group, and to every member of the group for their commitment, dedication and hard work. I know that some members of Harsag are in the gallery today. It is clear that shared vision of each member of the group to end homelessness and their commitment to social justice, which was very much shared by us and the Scottish Government, was crucial to working with such pace and clarity. The context for the 70 detailed recommendations is a vision of a whole system approach, where prevention of homelessness is paramount, where the responsibility lies not just with the local authorities but with all parts of the public sector. Where homelessness does occur, rapid rehousing should be the default position, avoiding the need for temporary accommodation. Recognising that some people need more than just a house and have multiple and often complex needs, that must be addressed alongside homelessness. The action group has been very clear that the housing first model of intensive support should be available in those cases. For those who require the emergency safety net of temporary accommodation, their time should be as short as possible. It should be spent in accommodation, which is of a high standard, and in a location that minimises disruption to their daily lives. Earlier today, I confirmed the Government's acceptance of the final set of recommendations. Those set out actions to end homelessness altogether and address the wider risk factors for homelessness, including poverty, social security and migration policy. This morning, I announced a significant allocation of £21 million from the £50 million Ending Homelessness Together fund to support that transition to rapid rehousing and housing first. That includes a £1.5 million contribution over two years from the health funding that has been made available this year for addiction services, demonstrating our commitment to joint working at a strategic level and to working across portfolios. I am pleased to say that we have already begun the work that is required to take the recommendations of the action group forward. The homelessness prevention and strategy group, which I co-chair alongside the spokesperson, Councillor Elena Whitham, will oversee the development of the implementation plan for not only the action group's recommendations, but also those from the local government and communities committees' report on homelessness. Local authorities are already carrying out excellent work across Scotland to prevent and tackle homelessness. We, along with local government, the third sector and wider public sector partners, have been working hard to prevent homelessness in Scotland over many years. I pass on my sincere thanks to all of them for their work.  By the end of this decade, £4 billion in benefit cuts will come out of Scotland, pushing people into debt, rent arrears, the uses of food banks and will push more folk into crisis. Although we are spending a record £125 million this year on welfare mitigation to protect those on low incomes, much of which is mitigating the awful bedroom tax, we need to be vigilant about those situations. We know from reports such as the national audit office and crisis reports that have pointed to the devastating impact that those welfare cuts are having, which is leading to more homelessness, and that is predicted to rise despite our efforts to mitigate the impact. It is vital therefore that we continue to work in partnership with all local authorities and we continue our engagement with the housing options hubs, as that has been a key to embedding a prevented approach to homelessness. Can we end homelessness in Scotland? I, we can, but it is important that we get it right and bed and change and improvement for the long term. We need to make the most of the current opportunity and ensure that all parts of the public and third sector are aligned in their aims and activities. We need to develop a system that helps those who need it most wherever they are. I am proud to say that, where homelessness does occur, Scotland already has some of the strongest housing rights for homeless people in the world. We have strong foundations and, thanks to the action group, a compelling and positive vision for the future. I look forward to working towards ending homelessness and rough sleeping for good in our country. The minister will now take questions on the issues raised in his statement. I will allow around 20 minutes for questions, after which we have to move on to the next out-of-business class members who wish to ask a question to press their buttons across to speak buttons now. I call First Lady and Graham Simpson, Mr Simpson, please. Thank you. I thank the minister for advance sight of what turned out to be a particularly woolly statement. I also congratulate him on keeping his job. He is committed to accepting the recommendations of the action group in principle, yet he has said little in detail today about what he means by this. There is nothing concrete in this statement, no bricks and mortar, to help the homeless. I agree with the minister that we can end homelessness, but we need more than warm words. Can I ask some specific questions? Hasag has spoken in the past about housing first. The phrase does not appear in today's recommendations, so I am assuming that rapid rehousing is the same thing. Can the minister say in detail how he plans to roll out housing first across Scotland, where, how many units and at what cost? Can I ask about another area, recommendation 6, which deals with people constituting the highest proportion getting into rough sleeping? The report talks about people leaving public institutions and those with previous experience of those institutions such as prison, mental health service, services and armed forces. That is particularly important, given that the number of homeless applicants formerly in the armed services in Scotland increased by 11 per cent in the last year. Does the minister have any specific announcements that would help those most vulnerable people? A 10-minute statement to Parliament does not give the minister the opportunity to respond to all 70 recommendations that are being put forward by Hasag, but I think that one of the things that Mr Simpson should recognise is that today I announced £21 million worth of funding to allow for rapid rehousing and housing first to be rolled out in specific areas first and then across the country. Beyond that, we have brought together funding from other portfolios to ensure that those folks who have addiction problems are dealt with in an appropriate manner and that that funding follows the person itself. As Mr Simpson is well aware, I have had numerous meetings with colleagues right across the Government and with stakeholders right across the country to make sure that we get our approach absolutely right in that. That does mean getting service provision aligned and he talked about folks who were leaving public institutions. He will know that we currently have the care review going on and I want to make sure that everyone who leaves care is given the appropriate opportunity to access housing. We are all corporate parents and we have a duty, as we do, to our own children, nephews and nieces to make sure that we get this right. Beyond that, in terms of public institutions, he will be aware that, in terms of the Scottish Prison Service, the shore standards have now been put in place just recently in November last year, if I remember rightly, to get it right for those who are leaving prison. Mr Simpson talks of bricks and mortar and we need more bricks and mortar. That is why this Government is investing £3 billion to deliver 50,000 affordable homes, 35,000 of those for social rent during the course of this Parliament. That is the biggest housing programme for decades—certainly the biggest housing programme since devolution. If Mr Simpson wants to persuade his colleagues at the Treasury to release the purse strings to allow for more capital spend in Scotland, I am sure that I could oblige him by spending a little bit more. Pauline McNeill, please. On behalf of Labour, I thank the working group chaired by John Sparks for the incredible work that they have done on tackling homelessness. Homelessness is a real crisis in our society witnessed every day on the streets of Scotland. The minister did not mention that it is the fourth year in a row that the number of children living in temporary accommodation is risen by 9 per cent. Those families spent an average of 2,004 days. I would like the minister's assurance that those children and families will be a priority, given that the current Government has had a decade so far to deal with it. Rough sleeping on our streets is on the rise. People are dying on our streets. Homelessness is a matter for some every 18 minutes. In fact, applications are up 1 per cent. Contrary to the statement that the minister has outlined, does the minister agree that tackling homelessness must be an integral part of the poverty agenda? It must become a priority for public health. The significant rise in those with mental health issues losing their tendencies tells us that it is more than bricks and mortars. Will the minister tell me today to what extent is he planning to have discussions with the new cabinet secretary for health to make sure that those views are represented at the cabinet table? Finally, in a recent Unison research, 69 per cent of council work has identified that the lack of front-line staff is a key issue in bringing those services together. Will the minister outline exactly what resources he will ensure that local government services have to deliver homelessness services? The £21 million is welcome. However, how is he going to conclude that the well-injected recommendations are complete? I thank Ms McNeill for her questions. Although homelessness applications have fallen by 39 per cent in the past decade, it is unfortunate that there has been that 1 per cent rise. I share her belief that no children should be sleeping in unsuitable temporary accommodation. That is one of the reasons why I have already reduced the time that can be spent in unsuitable temporary accommodation from 14 days to 7 days for families and pregnant women. I do not want to see anyone in unsuitable temporary accommodation. We have to remember that 80 per cent of families with children are in mainstream housing. I want to drive that percentage much higher. Obviously, I will have to co-operate with local authority partners to ensure that we make some real differences there. It would be fair to say that many local authorities are doing very well in that regard. There are one or two that need to do a huge amount more in that regard. On the intertwining of homelessness and other services, homelessness is not just about housing. It is absolutely vital that we ensure that services are aligned to ensure that people are supported in their homes. That is why I have already had discussions with ministerial colleagues from across portfolios, including in public health and mental health, as Ms McNeill outlined, around about their commitment to driving forward the change that is required. I will continue to do so with new ministerial colleagues as well. Ms McNeill can be assured of that. Ms McNeill asked about the £21 million specifically. The £21 million is for that transformational change to allow the investment to move to rapid rehousing and housing first in a number of areas. She asked about the future. We have seen in Liverpool with their housing first pilot there that the analysis by Crisis says that, after a point, the use of housing first becomes cost-neutral. I think that we could do more to learn about those examples of that. I am sure that Ms McNeill would be happy if I sent her further detail on that. I intend to go elsewhere during the course of the summer to see how they have done and to test some of the things that have been said. I understand that, when the two front benches ask questions, we have longer answers, we have longer questions, but I now have 10 minutes and 11 questionnaires. You can do the arithmetic. I want to try to get through it, so I am going to ask for short questions and short answers, please. I call first Bob Doris, followed by Michelle Ballantyne. Presiding Officer, I welcome one of the substantial recommendations in the report to reform the funding system for temporary accommodation, often high-cost and low-quality. That would include the devolution of housing benefit and greater support for those who are homeless. Can I therefore ask the Scottish Government how it will map out with COSLA how that would work in practice and when it would intend to make representations to the Scottish Government, so the UK Government, rather, in relation to this matter? Presiding Officer, I want to ensure that we fully understand the overall impact of those six recommendations around temporary accommodation and the finances of that. I have agreed already to work in partnership with COSLA to gather robust financial data from local authorities and officials will be working over the course of this summer, Presiding Officer, to gather that intelligence that will allow us to make an informed decision about the consequences of funding being devolved. I can assure Parliament that I will keep them up to date on all of that. I would like to thank COSLA very much for their full co-operation in all of that as we move forward. Michelle Ballantyne, followed by Kenneth Gibson. Noting your statement that you have accepted in principle all the recommendations and that you will take forward any of your power, I want to turn you to recommendation 3. Many of the organisations that I have met with, while in principle agreeing to the recommendation— No, please, just get to the question. I am sorry, please get to the question. This is the question that expressed a number of concerns about how that will be delivered, both financially in terms of housing stock. Does the minister have any costings for this recommendation and does he have any concerns about meeting this challenge? Minister, can I have a short answer, please? I can find recommendation 3. It is not at my fingertips at this moment, but what I can say to Ms Ballantyne is that, in all that we do, we will continue to talk to stakeholders to ensure that we can implement those recommendations. Some of that is not going to be easy, but what I would say is that in terms of our partners and local government and housing associations in the third sector and right across that stakeholder group, they are up for this. Now is the time to take the action, to achieve our ambition, to end rough sleeping and end homelessness in Scotland, and we will report back to Parliament as we progress. I know without a doubt that there will be further scrutiny from the local government and communities committee, and I look forward to that. I welcome the statement. What specific focus will the Scottish Government give to women who have been made homeless as a result of domestic violence? That is one of the things that has affected me the most. I met a group of women from Fife who put together a really immense report about the situations that they faced, where they, rather than the perpetrator of the crimes against them, were the ones who were being punished. I think that we need to have a look at the legislation that we have in place at this moment to see whether we can improve on all that, because I think that some of the things that are currently happening are unacceptable. The homelessness prevention and strategy group that I co-chair will look at all the recommendations and will scrutinise the action plan and drive that forward. I know that there are a number of folk around that table who will be looking very closely at the situation that women and families who face domestic abuse have gone through and how we can improve their situation in the future. There are 560 more children in temporary accommodation than there were last year. I have one constituent who is living in the most horrendous circumstances just now with an 18-month-year-old baby. Given that 70 per cent of all unsuitable accommodation breaches were in Edinburgh, can I ask the housing minister what direct conversations he has had with the leadership of the council to address the scandal in our capital city? I regularly meet with councillors from across the country and I met the housing convener from Edinburgh just this morning at the launch of the last set of recommendations. I have made it quite clear to local authorities that it is unacceptable to breach the unauthorised time limits. I will continue to drive that forward. I know that Edinburgh is working at this moment with its own action group, which is cross-party support. I know that, significantly, a number of the members of that group are the leaders of their groups on that council. I hope, with their help, that we can see real change here in Edinburgh. We are investing heavily in housing here in Edinburgh, but one of the things that we also need to do is look at allocation. Although the allocation policy of the council is right in terms of 73 per cent of people going to homeless, housing associations here in the capital city could do better in that regard. I know that Councillor Campbell will be talking to them in the very near future to ask for additional support and help from them. She has that support from me. Andy Wightman, Paul Ballack, Cole-Hamilton. I welcome minister's statement. Given that tenants can be evicted via schedule 3 of the private housing tenses Scotland act 2016, if a landlord or creditor intends to sell the property or if the landlord wishes to use the property for a purpose other than providing someone with a home such as renting out as a short-term let, does the minister agree that private rented sector tenants need greater security than they currently have? Minister, as Mr Wightman knows, since I took office, we have provided greater security for private sector tenants. I will continue to look at the private sector rented situation and see what more we can do. I am always willing to talk to Mr Wightman about some of those issues. If he wants to come and speak to me further about it, I am happy to meet him. Recommendation 5 covers provision for emergency accommodation for those migrant homeless population without recourse to public funds. Does the minister recognise as a particular group within that of women with insecure immigration status who are fleeing domestic abuse situations often with children supported by groups such as Shakti in our nation's capital? Does he accept that generic provision of emergency accommodation for that group may be unsuitable? Will he look to providing a bespoke solution for those women? I think that there are some difficulties around me giving a commitment to that here today because of the nonsense that is around about legislation on no recourse to public funds. I think that it would be much better if we joined as a Parliament to say that the no recourse to public funds policies of the UK Government are unacceptable and that it should remove them. I have talked to the UK Housing and Homelessness Minister around about those issues. Ms Wheeler has said that she is determined, Presiding Officer, to move forward in eradicating homelessness south of the border. I think that one of the greatest challenges that we have here in eradicating rough sleeping and homelessness here in Scotland is the no recourse to public funds situation. We have also had discussions with COSLA—my officials have had discussions with COSLA—and we are working our way through to see exactly what we can or cannot do in that regard. I expect them to report back soon on those issues. Beyond that, my colleagues in Government have written to numerous UK ministers asking them to get rid of this policy, which is having a real impact on many people who we welcomed here and who we should be continuing to support. How can the work of the homelessness and rough sleeping action group, alongside the Government's pre-existing work with local authorities, help to highlight and tackle rural homelessness? Although a huge amount of the focus is always on urban areas, I want to ensure that all areas of our country benefit from our strong homelessness rights and that they have the same opportunities as those living in cities. Rightly, each local authority works to its own local context, and that is recognised by the action group. However, the focus should be on the prevention of homelessness through person-centred housing options approaches. All 32 local authorities are involved in the housing options hubs, which promote and develop best practice to improve those services. If Ms Ross has specific problems in Caithness and Sutherland, I would be keen to hear about them because, although we have heard voices from rural Scotland, we could be doing with a few more of those voices being heard. There must be crisp questions and short answers, please, so that everybody gets those short. Mr Balfour, you set the bar. Thank you, Deputy Presiding Officer. Social Bight in Edinburgh has committed 800 homes for housing first. To support those individuals will cost a minimum of £6 million a year. Will the minister ensure that the Scottish Government underwrites local authorities' commitments to house and support the citizens of house and support services for as long as they need it? One of the things is that, at this moment in time, local authorities are responsible for homelessness, and they are spending homelessness budgets. For example, Glasgow's budget is some £70 million a year. What we are doing is ensuring that we put in place moneys that can transform services. It is absolutely vital that we do that. As I said earlier, evidence shows that, after implementation of housing first, costs are cost-neutral. We will support not only local authorities but social bight and others in terms of making sure that we get that right. I also expect local authorities to use their current budgets the best way that they possibly can to ensure that we move away from spending on unsuitable temporary accommodation, which we spend a lot of in certain cities, like Edinburgh, and focus that money on delivering for people in their own tenancies. Ruth Maguire will follow by Jackie Baillie. Can I ask the minister for further detail on how the £21 million will be used to ensure that change is implemented quickly and at scale? As Ms Maguire said, we are making up to £21 million of the ending homelessness together fund available to help councils and partners to develop housing first locally. We will work closely with them to ensure that the funding leads to necessary change and to understand more about how we can ensure that housing first programmes are sustainable alongside the wider work of housing services in every local authority in Scotland. We will also work with local authorities as they develop their rapid rehousing transition plans by the end of the year. Jackie Baillie will follow by Gordon MacDonald. Labour provided £36 million to end rough sleeping in the first Parliament, the Scottish Government has so far provided £328,000. How much more will be allocated specifically to tackle rough sleeping and what action will it take to improve the measurement of rough sleeping? I would say that we have put the £50 million ending homelessness together fund. In terms of rough sleeping this winter, we provided £328,000, as Ms Baillie knows, but it is not all about money. One of the things that was wrapped up in that £328,000 was personal budgeting, giving folk on the front line the flexibility to provide for the needs of people that they came across in the streets. That budget was £50,000, £25,000 for Edinburgh and £25,000 for Glasgow. In fact, the budget itself only spent £17,000 but made a huge difference to rough sleepers in both those cities. We will continue to look at those changes in delivery, many of which have worked. There will be full published analysis of that spend in the very near future, and I am sure that members will want to look at that closely indeed. What is the minister's view on the key recommendations of the action group that have made that could mark a real step change in eradicating rough sleeping and reducing homelessness? I think that one of the key things is getting housing first absolutely right and making sure that we do not just give people houses, we give them the support that they require, that each individual requires. That is the key to all of that. There is commitment in terms of my officials, there is commitment from local government partners, there is commitment right across the third sector, and there is commitment from all of this government to make this work. Together we can realise our ambition of ending rough sleeping and ending homelessness in our country. I am sorry to rush you but I have had to overrun by eight minutes to get you all in. We must have crisp questions and answers. That cannot always happen. I am going to give a slight break as the front bench changes over for the next debate but be very brief.


Hi and welcome to the session. Let us understand the following question today. Determine whether the following relation is reflexive, symmetric and transitive. Given to us is that relation R in the set A is equal to elements 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 as R is equal to x, y sub that y is divisible by x. Now let us proceed with the solution. Given to us is R is equal to x, y sub that y is divisible by x. It is a relation in set A which is equal to 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6. Now let us check for reflexivity. x is divisible by x for all x belongs to A. Therefore x, x belongs to R for all x belongs to A. Therefore R is reflexive. Now let us see for symmetric. Let us consider 6 is divisible by 2 but 2 is not divisible by 6. Here 2, 6 belongs to R but 6, 2 does not belongs to R. Therefore R is not symmetric. Now let's check for transitivity. Let x, y belongs to R and y, z belongs to R which implies y is divisible by x and z is divisible by y. Therefore z is divisible by x. Therefore x, z belongs to R. Hence R is transitive. Therefore we can see that R is reflexive, R is not symmetric and R is transitive. Therefore the final answer is reflexive and transitive but not symmetric. I hope you enjoyed this session. Bye and have a nice day.