Silicon Valley Chapter | SLA

Event: West Coast Chapter Chapters Reception - Monday, June 14, 2010

Are you attending SLA 2010 in New Orleans? If so, schedule to attend the annual West Coast Chapters Reception (WCCR):

• Date: Monday, June 14
• Time: 5:30-7:30 PM
• Location: Louisiana Supreme Court Building, The Law Library of Louisiana, 400 Royal Street - walking distance from the conference center

Thanks to Teresa Bailey and the SoCal Chapter, the organizers for the WCCR in 2010.

Event: Solo Librarians Meeting on April 7th - Wednesday, April 7, 2010

The Solo Librarians of the San Andreas Chapter of SLA invite you to join them at their next meeting on Wednesday, April 7th at 6 PM. Anyone with an interest in libraries is welcome, including students and recent grads of the MLIS programs.

 

The Solo Librarians will be meeting at the El Camino Hospital Health Library and Resource Center (http://www.elcaminohospital.org/Patient_Services/Health_Library) on the first floor of El Camino Hospital, 2500 Grant Road in Mountain View.  A map and directions to the library can be found at the link below.

 

There will be a tour of the Library conducted by senior librarian Jack Black.  The new Library opened with the new hospital in November 2009.  The library supports the physicians and nurses at the hospital and is also open to the public free of charge.  In addition to showing us the library, Jack will discuss the planning and building of the new library.

 

Those who are planning to attend need to contact Sonia Dorfman by April 2, 2010 at [email protected] or (650) 237-2784.  If you have already contacted Sonia, there is no need to do so again.

 

Sonia Dorfman

Eric Kristofferson

 

San Andreas Solo Librarians

 

Directions and Parking: http://www.elcaminohospital.org/Patient_Services/Maps_Directions/

 

Jack suggests parking in the North Drive Garage and using the Main Entrance or the New Main West Entrance to the Hospital.

Book Review - This Book is Overdue! How Librarians and Cybrarians Can Save Us All

Johnson, Marilyn (2010). This Book is Overdue! How Librarians and Cybrarians Can Save Us All. New York: Harper (ISBN 978-0-06-143160-9)

This is an easy-to-read and entertaining book. The author is clearly enthusiastic about the many talented, knowledgeable librarians she has met in her travels. The profession has undergone a number of dramatic transformations through the years especially as librarians have continued to stepped up to more complex problems. In addition, they have also made their users more aware of who librarians really are and what they are able to accomplish through their intellectual capabilities, training, experience, knowledge, and their use of technology. More than once librarians have "saved the organization’s bacon" by finding the missing data and magically using their instincts to pull together the various pieces to solve highly complex problems. Many library users are unaware that  professional librarians have great organizational and analytical skills, curiosity, wide-ranging knowledge, good memories, and usually a deep subject knowledge background.  But they (these users) all seem to appreciate the answers and information "we" provide them...In the newer environments special librarians are making use of avatars in their exploration of the virtual world known as Second Life. Johnson mentions this "knowledge seeking" activity in her book.

Johnson’s volume mentions a few early professionals, such as Frederick Kilgour who was one of the professionals in the early seventies. He headed the efforts to combined a few dozen college libraries catalogs into a world catalog, called the Online Computer Library Center (OCLC). Henriette Avram helped to automate the records of the Library of Congress. She is credited with writing the first code for the computerized catalogs called MARC (MAchine Readable Cataloging). According to this book the MARC format is still used today. Avram and others helped to inspire a generation of librarians to combine library work and computers. Computerized records helped libraries to change from a collection of books into automated research centers. The continuing strongest quality of librarians has been their desire to be of service. It has been said that perhaps their earliest values tended also to include truth, free speech and universal literacy. Many considered free access to information as the foundation of democracy.

There is continuous praise of librarians throughout this book. In addition there are interesting tidbits which add to its charm, e.g., the suggested use of Bounce dryer sheets to absorb musty book odors. Everyone should find something of interest as they read through This Book Is Overdue, including a few smiles or perhaps even chuckles. In addition to twelve enjoyable chapters, it also includes the following end sections: Chapter notes (pages 257-266); bibliography (pages 267-273) and acknowledgments (pages 253-257). I discovered this book through a review by Christine Rosen on page A17 of the February 9, 2010 of the Wall Street Journal.

Karen Takle Quinn

Registration Open: LOCKSS and CLOCKSS - Preserving Our Digital Heritage at Stanford

Interested in how library e-collections can be be preserved as a digital heritage? Realization that knowledge could be disappearing as publishers and content producers migrated to electronic platforms with uncertain shelf lives led to the founding of the widely recognized LOCKSS (Lots of Copies Keep Stuff Safe) program.

 

LOCKSS and CLOCKSS at Stanford: Preserving our Digital Heritage –
The Community Taking Control
Wednesday, March 17, 6 - 8 PM
Speaker: Victoria Reich, Director of LOCKSS Program, Stanford University Libraries
Location:  Roche Palo Alto

Registration URL:  http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/QCD6CDB

 

As a librarian who has both public service and technical service experience, and as one of the first employees of HighWire Press, Stanford University librarian Victoria Reich was concerned that an unforeseen consequence of the increased adoption of accessing digital journals by libraries was putting their ability to serve society at risk. To address this formidable challenge, in 1998 Stanford University Libraries started the LOCKSS Program ( www.lockss.org ).

 

Today, nearly a dozen years later, libraries worldwide use LOCKSS software to take local  custody of and preserve the e-materials important to their community. Over 400 publishers are preserving their titles on the  LOCKSS network. In addition, libraries with synergistic collections are building their own "private LOCKSS networks" to ensure the survival of their highly specialized or local interest content.

 

In this presentation, Victoria will discuss broad digital preservation principles, and share how libraries are using LOCKSS to preserve both purchased e-materials and local heritage e-materials. She will also introduce the CLOCKSS Archive  (www.clockss.org ). The CLOCKSS Archive has as its founding principles worldwide community governance, global library participation to preserve the content, and free Web access when archived content is no longer available from any publisher. 

 

WHEN: Wednesday, March 17 (St. Patrick's Day)

6:00 - 7 p.m.  Registration, networking and buffet dinner
6:50 - 7:00     Chapter announcements / introduce board members in attendance
7:00 - 8 p.m.  Speaker
8:00 - 8:30     Q & A 
  
COST:  SLA member - $25 ; Non-member or guest - $30 ;  SLA member between jobs/Retired - $15 ; Student - $15 

 
LOCATION:  Silvia Patrick, one of our members, will be hosting us at  Roche Palo Alto, 3431 Hillview Avenue, Palo Alto, CA 94304 http://www.roche.com/roche_worldwide-details.htm?id=140   

 

Roche Palo Alto is located in the Stanford Industrial Park.  Come early and stroll the campus which will be closed down in the summer of 2010.  Artwork and sustainable landscaping are scattered around the buildings.

 

Parking: Free in the Visitors’ Parking Lot, right off the first driveway by the flagpole at the main entrance. Bright green signs will point the way to the SLA Event at Roche Gallery Conference Room A2-1 

 

REGISTRATION URL:  http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/QCD6CDB   After registering, you will have the option of paying through PayPal (has an additional $1.50 service fee) or sending a check to the Registrar (pay for your own stamp and envelope).
 
DEADLINE:  Register by end of day, Friday, March 12th. Any checks must be received by Monday, March 15th. 

 

Please forward this to any colleagues who may be interested.

We're looking forward to seeing you there!  We're actively soliciting suggestions for programs for the new year, so bring your recommendations for speakers that you have heard.

Jean Bedord
Vicki Garlow
Program Directors, Silicon Valley SLA

Silicon Valley Announces “Design A Program Challenge” Winners

Abby Dansiger, Gayle Pellizzer, Susie Quinn, Rowena Weger and Mia Jaeggli are the winners of the San Andreas Chapter SLA Design A Program Challenge.  The award is sponsored by the local San Andreas chapter of the SLA.

The winning submission, "Creating Digital Exhibitions Using Open Source Solutions",  was judged on creativity, feasibility of production, cost effectiveness, relevancy to the profession and level of interest to information professionals.

Winners receive free admission to the program of their design and two additional chapter events during the 2010 programming year.  In addition, the chapter is sponsoring them for a full year SLA membership, including extra dues to cover one extra chapter in addition to San Andreas chapter membership.  This will enable winners who don’t live in the Bay Area to also join a chapter closer to their home base.

Please watch the San Andreas SLA blog for date and time of the award winning event presentation.

Event: Tools and Technologies for Distance Education at SJSU - Friday, February 26, 2010

 

Steven Kaye, Senior Researcher, Novarica and Cliff Mills

Debbie Faires, Assistant Director for Distance Learning at San Jose State University (SLIS '91) and Scott McCord, a current student, took twelve people through the distance learning tools available to SJSU's School of Library and Information Science (SLIS) students using Elluminate Live on February 26th, 2010. The Elluminate tool has a broad range of functionality including audio chat (without the need for dialing into a phone conference), file transfer, real-time polling and display of poll results, text chats, video and a whiteboard. Jean Bedord, San Andreas Chapter member and part-time instructor acted as host and began with an introduction to the SLIS program, almost 3000 students participating entirely through distance learning.

Debbie took over and talked about distance learning generally and the various tools available with their uses. In general attendees were interested in the experience of younger students and how they could use the Elluminate technology in other settings. She asked participants when they received their MLS degrees and what kind of experience they had with the Internet in their schooling. The SJSU MLIS program is ALA-accredited and ranked by U.S. News and World Report, and includes a Master of Archives and Records Administration and Gateway Ph.D. programs.

Tools used by students include ANGEL, Elluminate, and SLISLife (a closed social networking setup). Students are predominantly located in North America, but there are students in Europe, Asia and Oceania as well. People enjoy the flexibility of distance learning programs and Debbie cited a U.S. Department of Education meta-analysis study indicating that online teaching is more effective than purely face-to-face learning in terms of improving student results as well as several other studies pointing to widespread use of online learning.