ALIA Board Blog

The weekend is often for catching up - on the housework, back to school organising, the online and other reading, and some fresh air - in preparation for the week ahead.   Some of my online reading this weekend included prep for meetings with ministerial officers this coming week, expressing our opposition to mandatory filtering and pulling together case studies and comments for the ALIA submission.  Also catching up on Parliament too - and the positive and supportive comments by Senator Trood regarding the National Library of Australia and  ‘Indeed, it is a national treasure.’  Other parliamentary-related reading included Kevin Rudd’s new book ‘Jasper & Abby and the Great Australia Day Kerfuffle’.  We are hoping that Kevin (and Rhys Muldoon and Carla Zapel) might like to get involved in National Simultaneous Storytime this year on 26th May, as our chosen book has an animal theme as well, being ‘Little White Dogs Can’t Jump’.

This coming week marks ALIA’s first time (or first time in a long time) at the VALA Trade Exhibition - visit Kate, Steph, Judy, Margie, Jeannine and myself at Booth #43.    Either side of VALA, two of our key Advisory Committees are meeting face-to-face.  The first in-person gathering of the ALIA TAFE Libraries Advisory Committee and another important meeting of the ALIA Public Libraries Advisory Committee.   #ALIANational will be part of the #VALA2010 twittering as well.

It is the anniversary of the Victorian Bushfires - a message is on the ALIA Disaster Recovery webpage - and there is a Blue Shield Australia gathering this week too.

This week also marks Safer Internet Day on Tuesday 9th February.   You can download the video and/or add the logo to your site/facebook/twitter links.  It is an opportunity for library staff in all types of libraries to highlight the importance of cybersafety education.  In the meetings that I will be in with other IT industry stakeholders visiting ministerial advisors at parliament house in the next few days we will be reminding the government about our objection to censorship and to filtering legitimate material, as part of maintaining a democratic society.

And of course - Library Lovers Day (with or without the apostrophe) - to be celebrated at the end of the week ahead.  Most libraries are planning LLD events on Friday or next Monday the 15th.     Jan’s post below reminds us that we can all do something simple to remind our clients and friends to love Australian libraries.  I hope that many public librarians are using The Little Book of Public Libraries as an LLD ‘gift’ for their decision makers and champions, and for other sectors there are some great ideas on the website at http://www.librarylovers.org.au/ 

but wherever you are this week - may it be a good one.

Sue Hutley, ALIA Executive Director

January sees the start of the ALIA financial year and by the end of the month our auditors have arrived to do the analysis of the previous year’s accounts.  Our Annual Report financials in 2008 were clearly affected by the GFC.   At the end of the first full ALIA financial year after the financial squashing our investments received, we are starting to bounce back slowly.  ALIA House continues to be a major (but aging) asset with the next 3-year-annual re-valuation to be reflected in the 2009 figures.   Salaries and staff movements continue to be our major expense, as would be expected in an organisation where providing professional services and facilitating the many groups, committees, events, campaigns and activities to members is our priority.  A restructure of ALIA National Office management staffing began in December 2009 and will continue though the first half of 2010.  Positions will be advertised during coming months. 

The Board of Directors election nominations closed on 13^th January 2010 and the unusual situation of having the same number of nominations for available positions occurred.  This means that the Association is not required to conduct an election this year.  A number of members considered nominating this year (and discussed their intentions with our current board members) but indicated that it was just not quite the right time for them either personally or professionally.  A director position not only comes with significant responsibilities (ASIC and AICD give good summaries) but also a great time commitment.  To enable greater effectiveness for board processes, the ALIA Board has implemented a few changes how the company’s board started out in the early 2000’s in regards to meetings and board decisions.  The board meets more frequently than in the past – with teleconference meetings (as official board meetings) in between the face-to-face meetings often held in Canberra or other capitals (as I write this I am on the plane to a board planning meeting in Brisbane, the closest location for three of our current board members).   We also have 6 Standing Committees of the Board, which a board member chairs. The focus of these SC’s is high level discussion, research, reports and recommendations also using key expert member input, for that board member Chair to bring to board meetings.  It allows a board member to focus on one or two area of strategic importance for the Association – while at the same time getting the summaries and overall picture by hearing from other board members and the Executive Director.  Our congratulations to Margaret, John, Andrew and Julie and we look forward to working with you all and getting ready for your official terms from May2010 to May2012. We also acknowledge their employers and staff and families who will be supporting them in their role as a board member (it really is a combined effort).

Other members expressed their interest in nominating this year, but after further information realised that they may need more background in finance or governance, or just learning more about the wide scope of work of the Association to become a more productive board member so that they might get the best out of their 2-year term on the board.  The ALIA Boardroom Bound program will continue and you can sign up for a board buddy.  Some potential board members have considered nominating for an ALIA Advisory Committee in the meantime.  We need quite a few more members to assist with these committees – nominations are being called again in the March edition of inCite, so keep a look out for that.

Advocacy will be a great focus for us at ALIA in 2010.  Over the past few weeks it has centred on the ISP filtering proposals and RC Classification and the ACMA blacklist.  Your case studies so far on examples of how library-related enquiries and research work can be inhibited by ISP filtering have been very useful for our submission – please continue to send your comments and responses to advocacy@alia.org.au by 10^th February so that we can finalise the submission by the due date.

Following on from the ALIA Public Libraries Summit we are also continuing on with the discussion around the social inclusion contribution that libraries make to society.  It’s sometimes interesting to see who reads blog posts – including comment from the Social Inclusion Minister these past few days (thanks Ursula for taking the time).  We are very much looking forward to working with DEEWR, the Social Inclusion Board and Senator Stephens’ office on continuing to place libraries at the centre of our community contributions in this area.  Her comments on literacy and reading and the national agenda comes at a time when our third ALIA Summer Reading Club is coming to an end and the announcement of the book for National Simultaneous Storytime for 2010 is made.  ALIA members should feel proud of the contribution that these national reading campaigns contribute to the nation’s literacy agenda – and they are great fun too.  We hope you have enjoyed ‘Reading on the Wild Side’ and are now placing your order for ‘Little White Dogs Can’t Jump’ and putting the date of 26 May 2010 into the diary to organise a reading session in your library – no matter what type it might be.  The importance of reading and literacy, and how literate citizens improve our society, can be highlighted by library staff everywhere.

Sue Hutley, ALIA Executive Director

 The team behind my earlier performance were particularly keen on a re-run; believe me we created a monster during that exercise when a borrowed video recorder and a whiteboard on wheels masquerading as an autocue created a sense of ‘Cecil B DeMille’ amongst my colleagues. Luckily fate in the form of the pre-Christmas rush put such silliness to rest and my on-line Yuletide presence is limited to this blog.  

We all have “must read” blogs in our lives. One of mine (apart from this one!) is written by Kathy Doughty from Material Obsession. Last week she captured my mood when she wrote:

I always find this time of year very reflective.  The calendar mind map is always interesting as the year stretches out ahead and then, as if by magic, it is so many pages turned.  I can’t help but stop and sit for a minute and review all the wonder of the past year.   

2009 has been a huge year for ALIA. I will remember it as the year in which we:

• Integrated the results of the member survey into our planning and as a result focused on your # 1 priority, lobbying and advocacy, at the National Advisory Congress

• Weathered the global financial crisis

• Contributed to the discussion on issues affecting our industry; the National Broadband Network, Parallel Importation and internet filtering (to name a few)

• Enhanced the range of PD opportunities including access to online resources and current awareness services

• Worked with fire devastated Victorian communities in the Rebuilding with Books project

• Hosted the first Australian Public Libraries Summit which has led to the development of a Vision and National Framework for the sector

• Delivered Library and Information Week, Summer Reading Club and National Simultaneous Storytime

• Collaborated with other library and information associations

• Held a stand out Library Technician’s Conference in Adelaide

• Worked with LIS educators to accredit courses

• Supported IFLA in their decision to relocate the 2010 Congress to Gothenburg

• Embraced Library 2.0 technologies

And they’re just the things I was able to come up with on a hot December afternoon following a lunch time of shopping.

None of this would have been possible without our:

• fabulous ALIA National Office staff

• Local Liaison Officers

• dedicated Board of Directors

• committed volunteers

• and you our loyal members.

To you all a huge thank you.

As we count down the final days of 2009 I would like to send you all my very warmest wishes for the festive season. It has been a great pleasure to meet, work and reconnect with many of you during the year and I look forward to more of the same in 2010.

Jan

Jan Richards, ALIA President

National Simultaneous Storytime 2009 was a once again a great success with over 960 locations across Australia joining in on the simultaneous reading of Pete the Sheep at 11am on Wednesday 27^th May.

National Simultaneous Storytime is run each year as part of the Library and Information Week activities and highlights the importance of reading and literacy and encourages a love of books in young Australians. With the help of its funding partner, Copyright Agency Limited (CAL)’s Cultural Fund, NSS this year was a even bigger than last year with ALIA selling over 40,000 Pete the Sheep stickers!

We have already had a number locations contacting us to say how much fun they had (also see note from Jan Richards below) and how the children loved Pete the Sheep as the Storytime book. The story, which about Pete is who is an amazing sheep that does things a little differently to his woolly cousins, definitely lends itself to some creative storytime ideas (especially with cotton wool!). Yass Regional Library had a visit from three real live sheep and three boardie-collie dogs to the thrill of the local children, Cleve Area School Library organised to have a live sheep shearing for students in conjunction to their storytime activities and Scarborough State School Library organised for their LOTE teacher to translate and read the story in Japanese (did you know that a sheep say mee mee in Japanese rather than baa baa?!).

The staff at ALIA National Office always look forward to National Simultaneous Storytime as a chance to do away with the computer and phone for a short while and satisfy their inner child with some colouring-in and animal mask making. A number of staff members got into the mood by donning their Akubra’s and Ugg boots (dressing up as shearers) especially for the storytime.

Myself and ALIA’s Events Manager, Kamara Schlegel, made the short trip across the NSW border to Braidwood Library where Jackie French, author of Pete the Sheep, read her book for National Simultaneous Storytime. Jackie had the 40 children in attendance captivated for the entire reading, some audience participation was needed and before we knew it we were baa-ing and woof-ing along with the rest of Australia!   It was a great day and thanks to all the libraries, child-care centres, schools and work places for getting involved.                                        Sue Hutley, Executive Director

National Simultaneous Storytime day is drawing to a close. I’ve had some great feedback from libraries across  Australia and many of your emails have made me smile. Perhaps none more than the one from Dell Price at Central Murray Regional Library at Deniliquin in regional NSW.

She writes that a new and enthusiastic Children’s Services staff member thought it would be a great idea to have the “real thing”. Consequently some lambs were delivered to the Library and installed in a pen outside.  2 seconds later the lambs escaped with library staff (mostly townies) in hot pursuit. Not liking their new surroundings the lambs once again took off.  Dell recounts “by this time the children were all arriving with not a staff member in the library to be seen - we were all chasing these *****lambs.” Finally they were recaptured and after a search of the library’s resources a barricade was erected to keep them in.

Not surprisingly NSS started at 11.20 and was accompanied by whispers of a lamb BBQ for lunch! Dell’s advice for others planning activities with animals - wear flat shoes!

Hope your day was as much fun.

Cheers

Jan Richards

ALIA President