ALIAWest Report Back Meeting held on 28th September 2016

ALIAWest Report Back Meeting Feedback

Great Southern Room, State Library of WA

Wednesday, 28^th September 2016

The ALIAWest Report Back Meeting commenced with drinks, nibbles and a chance to chat at 5:30pm.

The 15 attendees were well informed by speakers Vanessa Johnson, Stephanie Musk, Jessica Madureira and Andrew Kelly.

Vanessa attended the ALIA National Conference and her favourite speakers included:

Danielle Hoffman’s Back from the brink: saving the Queensland Department of Agriculture Library;
Susannah Sabine’s 23 (research data) things: creating opportunity in an increasing data driven world;
Belinda Weaver’s Library Carpentry workshop, Barbara Shack’s Libraries without borders, and
Kate Torney, whose background in media made a very entertaining presentation.

Vanessa also presented her own ˈBig data, small libraryˈ.

ALIAWest’s Stephanie Musk, attended the 82^nd IFLA World Library and Information Congress in Ohio. Stephanie felt a downfall was missing sessions of interest due to a clash in times. Stephanie participated in the Great Public Library Tour, visiting 21 libraries and 9 library systems. She extended her time after the conference, and managed to take a whopping 2,000 photos in three weeks!

ALIAWest Convenor, Kym Andrews, posed the question “What would you bring back to your library?”. Stephanie replied, “Wi-Fi at events, or make Wi-Fi permanent in parks”. Stephanie also discovered a wonderful shoe shop in her travels. Sharing her photos and wearing a lovely pair of shoes purchased from the shop created much delight and discussion in the room!

Jessica is the recipient of the 2016 Kay Poustie Scholarship Award. Jessica presented her poster ˈInnovation: flick the switch on!ˈ at the 82^nd IFLA World Library and Information Congress. Jessica commented there was bad and good to presenting a poster. A few ˈbadsˈ included: Presenting a poster takes time away from attending sessions of interest, and no coffee, pit-stop or lunch breaks! However, the good was it was a great experience, and a fabulous networking opportunity made worthwhile by the people she had met. Jessica discovered many service variances on the Great Public Library Tour between the libraries she visited, her highlight was visiting the Thompson Library at the Ohio State University.

Andrew was the Convenor of ˈThe Unexpectedˈ, ALIA’s WA Symposium. Andrew intended the symposium to be more about meeting people, focus on sharing ideas, and creating links between the different libraries. Andrew chose papers that would create discussion, and decided to email the papers to attendees which would assist with posing questions to the speakers. While questions were asked throughout each session, the open forum discussion created an atmosphere of camaraderie. Andrew learned that the next symposium should allow more group chat time. Andrew’s survey resulted in 50% of participants responding; participants enjoyed the engagement. Well done Andrew!

This concludes the notes on the ALIAWest Report Back Meeting.