Tag Archives: leadership

Free Professional Development

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ALA Poster  (ca. 1918)

One of the most important parts of being a professional (in any field) is staying up-to-date with the literature and technical/hard skills required to thrive in your field.

Librarians, like all professionals, should continue to both hone their current skills and develop and learn new ones.

Additionally, library managers and supervisors may wish to use online professional development to train new support staff and para-professionals or to cross train seasoned staff.

Here are some great online (and free) professional development sites for librarians and archivists.

Connecting to Collections Care (Resources)

Digital Public Library of American (Public Library Partnerships Project)

Idaho Commission for Libraries (Continuing Education)

InfoPeople Webinars

Library of Congress (Librarians and Archivists)

OCLC WebJunction

Utah State Library (Webinars)

UW-Madison iSchool Webinars

Wyoming State Library Training Calendar
(up-to-date calendar of professional development training opportunities)

 

 

 

Image credit to Boston Public Library

Leadership Matters

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Sweet Briar College, 1930s

Historic institution, Sweet Briar College, received a record number of applicants for the 2017 academic year. If you’ve not heard of Sweet Briar College, it’s the college that nearly closed in 2015. According to the previous board the college faced “insurmountable financial challenges.” Turns out, the challenges weren’t insurmountable, the current leadership just wasn’t up to them. A large number of Sweet Briar Alumnae rose to the challenge, raising $30 million in 100 days, and launching a legal battle was won after moving all the way to the Virginia Supreme Court. The college had just overhauled their library (more here). The current president, Phil Stone, relates the fascinating story (one year later) in this recent piece in the Roanoke Times.

 

Image credit to Boston Public Library.

 

 

Colonial North American Project

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Harvard Library is in the process of digitizing and releasing all known archival and manuscript materials in the Harvard Library that relate to 17th and 18th century North America. More information HERE.