Thursday, December 18, 2008

A Resource Sharing Christmas Carol

We three kings of resource sharing are
Bearing books and articles we traverse afar
Field and fountain, moor and mountain
Searching to fill ILL request forms

O Library of wonder, star of night
Library with royal treasures bright
Westward leading, still proceeding
Guide us to thy Perfect inter library loan

Born a manuscript on Bethlehem's plain
Copies I bring to make libraries live again
Reign forever, ceasing never
Offering access for all to gain

O Library of wonder, star of night
Library with royal treasures bright
Westward leading, still proceeding
Guide us to thy Perfect inter library loan

Books to offer have I
Knowledge owns a sharing right
Collections and sharing, all readers raising
Blessed by resources, libraries most high

O Library of wonder, star of night
Library with royal treasures bright
Westward leading, still proceeding
Guide us to thy Perfect inter library loan

Articles are mine, the ideas of worlds
Breaths of life shining on ignorance dim
Learning, sharing, talking, mining
Released from our treasure holds

O Library of wonder, star of night
Library with royal treasures bright
Westward leading, still proceeding
Guide us to thy Perfect inter library loan

Glorious now behold our sharing
Public, Academic, Special and more
Alleluia, Alleluia
Linking minds to ideas of the world

O Library of wonder, star of night
Library with royal treasures bright
Westward leading, still proceeding
Guide us to thy Perfect inter library loan

Wednesday, December 17, 2008

Library Christmas


Wishing you a very Library Christmas - some celebration activities:

Start the day singing:

"One the first day of Christmas" (note the presents are in alphabetical order starting with Calling Birds)

"Have yourself a very Dewey Christmas"....

"I saw three catalogue records go sailing by"....

"We three resource sharing librarians of orient are"


The begin opening presents after sorting them by size (open the folio's first) and colour.


Wishing you a very merry 394.2663 and a happy 394.2614

Roxanne

Tuesday, December 16, 2008

New Librarians - they are out there are making a big difference!

I was very very fortunate to attend the New Librarians Symposium in Melbourne earlier this month. It was truly inspiring with Tania Barry and her team bringing together a magnificent set of presenters and an even more impressive group of attendees.

It was very impressive to see around 250 new librarians (mostly with 5 or less years experience in the profession). They were energetic, focused on creating even better library services, enthusiastic up-takers of technology and had a great spirit of working together.

Tania Barry the convenor did a wonderful job with a terrific team – some of whom are pictured below. Elaina Norlin (at the front of the picture) from the US gave a wonderful presentation of how a new librarian can do anything – including writing a book on usability of web sites and travel the world speaking at library events.



Papers should be available shortly at http://conferences.alia.org.au/newlibrarian2008/

Great photos can be seen online at: http://www.flickr.com/groups/504662@N20/pool

Sunday, December 7, 2008

ACTive ALIA award winners for 2008

Nicola Cross was awarded the ACTive ALIA Initiative award 2008

Nicola Cross has made major contributions to the activities of ACTive ALIA in Canberra over the past year and has always been an active member of the group. Nicola is a very pleasant, willing and enthusiastic member of the library profession and has done a lot to develop others in the profession both by her work as the Information Statistical Skills development officer at the Australian Bureau of Statistics and as a member of the Australian Government Libraries and Information Network (AGLIN) training taskforce and the AGLIN/ACTive ALIA joint information sharing sessions. Nicola is responsible for the administration and booking of worthwhile speakers for this seminars as well as the extensive work she has done for AGLIN organising a variety of speakers to provide inexpensive training opportunities of librarians and related professionals.

She has always contributed to the profession and encouraged others to do so. She is an active member of the Library Technicians Group and has nurtured others to reach their full potential in this sector of the profession. She teaches the full range of cataloguing and metadata work to students at the Canberra Institute of Technology as well as contributing to ALIA. She is a pleasant, keen and willing member of any library group, prepared to go the extra mile to assist others with their professional development in her voluntary capacity and in her professional work teaching information and statistical literacy skills to others.

Nicola has contributed significantly to the ALIA Library Technicians Group, ACTive ALIA, AGLIN/ACTive ALIA Information Sharing forums and AGLIN Training and Development Taskforce. She is a dynamic, enthusiastic and delightful member of the profession.

Helen Roberts was awarded the ACTive ALIA Outstanding Contribution Award, 2008.

Helen has been an associate member of ALIA throughout her working life in libraries. She has been an enthusiastic and committed member of the ACTive ALIA Group (formerly ACT Branch) and of the ACT University and College Libraries group (URLs). For many years she served on the Executive of each group, has been President of the URLs group and was Convenor of ACTive ALIA from 2001 to 2004.

Helen has been a frequent contributor to ProACTive, the newsletter of ACTive ALIA, writing news items, a regular Convenor’s column, and notes on professional issues.

In these roles Helen has been an informal mentor to her colleagues and has provided support and advice to ALIA colleagues in the ACT.

Helen was the Law Librarian at the Australian National University for 17 years until her retirement in 2006. She was a committed professional with deep subject expertise in addition to her library qualifications, having completed her law degree at the Australian National University in 1995. Helen was responsible for the development of innovative services at ANU Law Library, including establishment of the Law Library’s formal role in teaching law students the skills of legal research. Helen was also the Copyright Officer for the Australian National University.

Helen has been a very active member of the Australian Law Librarians group, and was the State news editor for the Australian law librarian.

Helen has contributed to ALIA Group activities and committees in the ACT (see Criterion 1). She has also participated in ALIA activities at the national level, having been a member and Chair of the ALIA Copyright and Intellectual Property Advisory Group, and a member of the Australian Libraries Committee on Copyright and the Australian Digital Alliance.

In 2002 Helen was awarded a Silver Pin for her contribution to ALIA committees and activities.

Helen has been generous with her time and expertise in support of ALIA and other professional groups such as the Australian Law Librarians group. She has given many presentations in the ACT and elsewhere in Australia on law librarianship, copyright, intellectual property, and purchasing electronic resources. Helen has always been willing to participate in seminars and panel discussions on the implications for librarians of changes in copyright or intellectual property legislation, and she has contributed to discussions on a wide range of professional issues.

Helen Roberts has made an outstanding contribution to ALIA at both local and national levels.

Well done Nicola and Helen!

Wednesday, December 3, 2008

Size does matter: JCPAA report into the efficiency dividend

You may be interested to read the report of the Committee at
http://www.aph.gov.au/house/committee/jpaa/efficdiv/report.htm#chapters


Cultural agencies are addressed in chapter 3.

The recommendations include:

Recommendation 3

The Department of Finance and Deregulation, the Australian Public Service Commissioner and each cultural agency jointly develop a new funding model for cultural agencies. This model should recognise the importance of funding the mandate for growth and development of collections and the proportion of their expenses apportioned to depreciation. The Committee notes that recommendation 8 will also apply to these agencies.
Recommendation 7

The Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet convene a taskforce with membership from key agencies, including the Australian Public Service Commission, to conduct and publish further analysis on:

􀂄 the relationship between gender wage disparities and agency size and function;
􀂄 the relationship between wage disparities generally and agency size and function; and
􀂄 whether staff classifications continue to represent equivalent levels of skills, responsibility and experience across agencies.
If collecting further data or enhancing databases is required, the agencies involved should receive supplementary funding.
Recommendation 8

The Government either:

􀂄 exempt the first $50 million of all agencies’ appropriations from the efficiency dividend, excluding departments of state (the preferred option); or
􀂄 exempt the first $50 million of the appropriations of all agencies that have departmental expenses of less than $150 million, excluding departments of state.
These benchmarks to be indexed over time.