ALIA Sydney

Did you miss the talk on ALIA's Year of Renewal with Sue McKerracher, ALIA Executive Director? If you did, ALIA Sydney was there in force to listen and voice our opinions on the future of ALIA. Have a look below at a snapshot of the meeting!
 

ALIA National Advisory Congress 2012

with Sue McKerracher, Executive Director of ALIA
hosted by the State Library of New South Wales and Alex Byrne, State Librarian

What is ALIA? Are we an exclusive or inclusive professional association?

ALIA is  like a fried egg:

The centre yolk consists of the traditional library professionals: qualified librarians & library techs. The white of the egg are the people in the library world who perform other functions: systems, IT, marketing, etc. ALIA has to represent and work for both groups.

Why does ALIA exist?

1.       In the beginning, a group of librarians combined funds to pay other people to do things they didn’t have the time or perhaps the skills to do (advocacy, government lobbying, interstate communication) to create a support centre for the profession

2.       ALIA is the combined strength of library and information professionals

3.       ALIA is an advocate for libraries and library professionals. They delve into problems facing the profession, do the research and communicate to government, corporate and library bodies

Some recent examples of ALIA’s advocacy

·         National Year of Reading: Took librarianship and reading to the national stage and gained federal support for libraries (even though they don’t fund libraries)

·         In 2013, ALIA is promoting teacher librarians in the face of funding cutbacks. Since ALIA has a seat at the recent interagency Cybersafety Council, ALIA has been promoting teacher librarians as champions for anti-bullying measures online. ALIA will unveil an advocacy campaign for teacher librarians on 1/3/13.

·         Saving TAFE library staff in Queensland

What next? 2012-13: A time of renewal

1.       Feel positive emotional connection with ALIA

2.       ALIA believes & supports that you believe in

3.       ALIA is well-run, provides good value

 

Planned changes

1.       New website

2.       Re-engaging with LIS community

3.       Improve member experience

4.       Enhanced advocacy

5.       Special projects

a.       Future of the profession: Like SLNSW’s scenario planning

b.      Opening up the PD Scheme to all library staff

c.       Creating a certified professional status by mid-year

d.      Position paper on eBooks & e-lending including a free session at Info Online and a think tank summit in Melbourne on 12 March

e.      Incite will change from 11 to 9 issues with more pages and stories; a new weekly e-newsletter will go out starting next week

f.        Taylor & Francis will take over the Australian Library Journal and will promote Australian content worldwide

g.       Conferences will be made more affordable through input from members

h.      More local activities with a goal of 72 local ALIA groups

6.       Publications

7.       Conferences

8.       Local activities

Open Discussion on the following topics:

 

 

 

Enjoy!

 

-Jeff

User Education Librarian