Bridgett's ALA experiences

ALA 2007 Annual Conference Experiences by Bridgett Johnson with many thanks to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Webjunction and the Montana State Library for making it a reality.

Arrived at BWI rode to Hilton Washington in a black Town Parke limo- like car and treated like royalty. The trees along the freeway were amazing.

We stayed at the Hilton Washington and had a view of the city, the pool, blooming magnolias and streets from the 4th floor. Thursday was spent getting orientated around Dupont Circle, the Metro.

Friday, we figured out buses and went to The Rural Sustainability Forum.

The Forum was very well done and gave us some very helpful strategies for conducting our own meeting environments. I wrote on my evaluation though, that the introduction part was good but it would have been better before the actual work part of the Forum. It could have started earlier so there would have been enough time for it.

The world café strategy is going to be a very useful one to work with the staff, board, community groups and commissions. We will be getting on board with the MaintainIT project, their cookbook will be fun to try.

I also suggested that the Forum like this should take place the day before the conference started. Like on Thursday in this example. There seemed to be a lot of sessions on Friday that would have been interesting to go to.

Tech Atlas has given us a great tool in our computer management and it is really useful. I used to rely on our commercial tech person to help decide what and when we should update our technology. With TechAtlas, I am getting better at making those decisions on a regular basis for our library.

The evening get together was fun too. Networking with others from the Forum was a lot of fun.

Saturday: I went to Books and Babies session, the information gained there will help us to develop an early literacy program for our library.

Bringing in the Boys session was rewarding in the concepts and directions that it sent us.

The next session I went to was Word of Mouth Marketing is Everybody’s Job. The speakers were great, their ideas workable and relevant . One really good idea I took away is to get information to realtors and apartment managers about your library.

Then I went to Getting What you’re Worth Salary Workshop. It included the results of the ALA-APA survey of rural library workers and the interesting work that the Vermont public libraries did to improve their salaries.

Trit trot to Washington: The Whys and Hows of Using Rhymes, Songs and books for Early Literacy programs was a lot of fun.

At the Opening General Session Senator William Bradley spoke and I am so glad that I was able to listen to him. I was floored by the things he said in a good way a wake up call as to what is really going on in our government and policies.

Sunday: Started out very early with Breakfast with YA Authors. I met with some notables authors and had about 15 minutes discussion with about ten of them. It was a great breakfast.

The Prime Time Family Reading Time sounds so great. We are going to try to get a Vista Volunteer this next budget year so that we can try out this program and the Read to Me program.

I really wanted to listen to Judy Blume but I went to Libraries Prosper with Passion, Purpose, Persuasion: A PLA toolkit. It was a good session but unfortunately the toolkit wasn’t available yet but it was important to get it on our radar.

Robert F Kennedy really transformed me. I had never heard anyone ever speak up about the administration and what games the government and media are playing in our world. It was a real eye opener. There were too many good sessions in this time block but it was worth listening to Mr. Kennedy.

At 6 I attended the 2007 Newbery/Caldecott/Wildrer Banquet. Wow was I impressed. The calibur of people that are writing excellent literature for young people is amazing.

Monday started bright and early with Raising Readers again giving us more ideas on enticing reluctant readers with great books and authors. This had several award winning authors who were terrific and very open about why they wrote what they wrote. I even won a book to read which was very good, “The Schwa”. But I missed the Forum ending session but this was a worthwhile session for me.

Julie Andrews was an inspirational speaker. There was a little too much on her past efforts and there could have been more time for her to speak.

Raising More Money: Sustainable Funding for Your Library had a terrific speaker, Terry Axelrod, and I would like to see Montana get her to talk to us. She represents the Benevon Company for nonprofit fundraising strategies.

Tuesday, my family and I took part in the Libraries Build Communities project. We went to the Marting Luther King JR Library and cleaned very old illustrated works of literature. We discovered number 31 of a limited print of Caldecott’s Illustrations as well as many other first editions. We didn’t actually get to see the vault where they were stored but our group cleaned about 1,000 rare and valuable books. It was a great experience.

Besides getting to fit in all the exhibits with great new ideas for libraries, the networking with all the librarians and publishers and authors was amazing. It was a very busy conference. I feel so fortunate that I was able to go and I hope that the ideas and information I gleaned from the conference will help Montana in planning some great programs that will help us to grow and make our best better.