New Generation Advisory Committee

What is NGAC?

The New Generation Advisory Committee exists to help strengthen the participation of recently graduated library and information professionals in the Association. The Committee provides advice to the ALIA Board of Directors on issues of relevance to students and new professionals. The Committee works to provide information to the Board and ALIA House staff to inform development and delivery of services for new professional and student members, with the aim of ensuring the Association's relevance to these groups.
 
NGAC works closely with the National Students and New Graduates Group while NGAC has an advisory role within the Association. Often, the Committee and the Students and New Graduates Group work together to achieve the common objective of increasing new graduate participation in the Association and engagement with the profession.
 

NGAC's current priority projects

The Committee works on priority projects and provides recommendations to the Board for decision and action. Current projects include:

 

Do you have comments or questions for NGAC?

Contact the current chair of NGAC, Alisa Howlett, who will forward your comments to the committee. 

 

Follow NGAC at @aliangac

 

NGAC Committee members: 

Alisa Howlett (Chair) |  James McGoran |  Eva Samaras | Hiba Kanj | Katie Miles-Barnes | Elizabeth Alvey | Elizabeth Smith |   

Alisa Howlett

 

Alisa Howlett is an information professional with experience in a variety of information settings, including special libraries, government information management, archives and recordkeeping and academic libraries. Alisa is currently a project officer in the higher education sector, facilitating and supporting projects related to improving library services and student learning experiences.

Alisa has a Bachelor of Business (Marketing and Public Relations) from Queensland University of Technology (QUT) and received her Master of Information Technology (Library and Information Science) in 2013. Her professional interests include community engagement in cultural heritage institutions; learning support in higher education; information and knowledge management, and how information is accessed and used for knowledge generation and innovation. You can find Alisa on Twitter @acrystelle or on her blog at http://www.acrystelle.com

James has worked at LINC Tasmania in both Hobart and Launceston, and currently works in a 7-12 college library in Launceston. Before working in libraries, he worked as an artist and repertoire  talent scout and sound engineer in Glasgow, Scotland, and taught English in a very small village in Nepal.

James graduated from the University of Tasmania with a Graduate Diploma in Information Management in 2012, and from the University of the West of Scotland with a Bachelor of the Arts in 2009 (and is contemplating a Masters of Education). He is passionate about library and information services advocacy, school libraries, engagement, literacy and digital literacy. His life is mainly family orientated, and enjoys good single malt whisky, the internet (just the internet in general) and food. He can be found on Twitter @jamesmcgoran tweeting mainly library thoughts, with the occasional pop-culture reference or baby picture. 

James is also the State Secretary for the ALIATas group. 

Eva is a Victorian Electronic Records Strategy Project and Research Officer at Public Record Office Victoria. She developed her archiving skills working at the Australian Broadcasting Corporation Archives and volunteering at RMIT Design Archives.

Eva has a Graduate Diploma in Information Management from RMIT University as well as a Bachelor of Arts in Communication, Media Arts and Production from the University of Technology, Sydney.

Prior to becoming an Archivist, Eva worked in Film Production, Media Advertising and Performing Arts industries. She is interested in learning more about the GLAMR sectors and developing her digital archiving and online communication skills. In her spare time Eva enjoys watching films, attending Gallery and Museum exhibitions, cooking and fashion.

Katie began her library career in 2008, and is thrilled to be working for Wyndham City Libraries. Over the last 8 years she has worked for several library services, including the Corangamite Regional Library Corporation (where she ran a small branch) and later at Monash University Library (where she got a taste for data science). 

She holds a Graduate Diploma of Information and Knowledge Management, and Bachelor of Fine Arts. The former gave her the opportunity to immerse herself in her favourite subject - public libraries - and the latter continues to be useful to her in ways she could never have imagined. 

In her spare time she likes drawing and gardening. Say hello on Twitter: @melbrarian 

Elizabeth is currently the manager of digitisation at the University of Queensland Library. She previously worked in special collections at Fryer Library and across various roles at the Queensland University of Technology Library, including reference librarian, liaison librarian, and academic skills advisor.

She has a strong interest in academic libraries and equipping students to effectively access both physical and digital collections. In her current role, Elizabeth is exploring how digital collections and technologies can support research.

Her library qualification is an ALIA recognised Masters of Information Technology (Library and Information Science) from QUT. She also holds a Bachelor of Arts with first class honours (Classical Language) from UQ.  

Elizabeth is currently the Assistant Librarian at the National Institute of Dramatic Art.  Previously, she has worked in records management and cataloguing roles at Sydney Opera House and the University of Sydney.  Outside the LIS field, she spent years sharpening her customer service skills by working in box offices across the arts and entertainment sectors.
 
Elizabeth graduated from Charles Sturt University in 2014 with a Master of Information Studies (Records & Archives Management), and holds a Diploma of Library/Information Services from Sydney Institute TAFE and a Bachelor of Arts (English & History) with Distinction from the University of New South Wales.  Her professional interests currently lie in the ways arts & industry practitioners interact with academic resources and services.  She is passionate about inclusive, community-based practice in librarianship and hopes to encourage collaboration amongst new professionals across the GLAMR sectors.
 
While she could talk your ear off about libraries, you'll probably also find her hanging around the bars and theatres of Sydney, drinking rum and looking up cat memes to show you on her phone.  Find her tweeting about all of these things on Twitter: @jinglefrisbee