Dan Savage: Opening General Session Keynote Speaker This is my fourth trip to New Orleans, and the first one in the past three where I didn’t arrive by bus! However, it is my first ALA here and that really makes for a different experience. The city is back to bustling, and you add in several... more ›
Dan Savage: Opening Keynote Dan Savage gave an inspirational keynote speech in which he described the necessity and motivation behind his It Gets Better Project. After a rash of teen suicides last year that were the result of teens being bullied for their presumed sexual orientation, Dan and his partner, (“husband in Canada, boyfriend in... more ›
I spent last week reliving my grad school days at the University of Virginia by taking a class at Rare Book School. RBS (not to be confused with RBMS, which is the ALA Rare Books and Manuscripts Section) offers a wide variety of weeklong classes, taught by experts in their fields, on everything from medieval... more ›
This year, the 26th Annual NASIG Conference was held in St Louis, Missouri. Sessions were devoted to several trends that have emerged for serials and other continuing resources, such as e-books, RDA, and the “Big Deal” for journal packages. Also, there were many sessions that highlighted a specific workflow that a library was doing well... more ›
On June 7th I headed to Chicago for the 2011 American Theological Libraries Association Conference. I went a day early to check out a few of my favorite haunts from my college days in Chicagoland. After I made it into downtown Chicago and checked in to the conference hotel, I took the train down to... more ›
At this year’s NASIG Conference, there were plenty of sessions on practical things (which I’ll discuss in a bit), but there were also several apt phrases and interesting concepts that jumped out at me. The first phrase came from a session on patron-driven access, where the speakers quoted Peter McCracken of Serials Solutions, who said,... more ›
I recently volunteered to help teach a workshop entitled “Preparing for a Digitization Project” through NC Connecting to Collections (C2C), an LSTA-funded grant project administered by the North Carolina Department of Cultural Resources. This came about as part of an informal group of archivists, special collections librarians, and digital projects librarians interested in the future... more ›
Craig, Wanda, Travis and I all spent mornings and afternoons out of the library becoming certified in CERT, the Community Emergency Response Team training. The training was extensive and exhausting. (Think CPR-First Aid-team building-survivor training and psychological distress all in one.) While the training was demanding, we did also have some fun. Each module was... more ›
This week, I attended the PDC class “Achieving Your Leadership Potential: Developing Extraordinary Leaders.” Meeting one hour each morning for four consecutive days, I found the class to be a valuable learning experience. The group of people I was seated with come from all across campus and have very different jobs than me. Human Resources,... more ›
From Monday through Thursday of this week, several ZSR Staff (Wanda, Mary Beth, Travis, and Craig) are participating in CERT Training. CERT stands for Community Emergency Response Team. The concept for this group was conceived after 9/11. The idea is to have a cadre of trained individuals prepared to respond in times of need. The... more ›