BEA leaves me breathless!

I know erotica is like ALL THE RAGE now but c'mon you guys, get your minds outta the gutter because .... just read ....

Please ‘scuse me while I catch my breath …. BEA was last week and after the catch up at work, I’m FINALLY able to fill you all in about ALL THE AWESOME that BEA had to offer.

I’m telling you guys, if you’ve not gotten the chance to go before, it is definitely worth the conversation with your library director or supervisor to  try to carve out a wee bit from the budget to attend because let me tell you – IT IS WORTH IT – and I’m not talking GET ALL THE ARCs worth it (that’s another post and also – gasp – NOT the angle I was going for when I got into this gig to begin with), I’m talking, expand your knowledge base, learn how to promote your library, meet amazing people in the industry, get a first peek at upcoming titles, really feel the LOVE for LIBRARIANS and libraries – WORTH IT.

At first I was a little discouraged that ALL the people were there to snag ALL THE ARCs – but then I saw the STANDING ROOM ONLY panel sessions and my theory was quickly squashed because you guys – these sessions were not your typical run of the mill – gather librarians for a panel – session – these sessions included presenters from the BIG 6 publishers, Twitter, ALA, and then some! Like TOP NOTCH people folks! Like, you have a question, you ask it DIRECTLY to the publisher or editor on the panel – AND you GET AN ANSWER! Talk about exhilarating! 

In addition to the panel sessions, I was fortunate enough to attend a couple of the Books & Authors breakfasts (more on that love in a separate post), as well as wonder the Exhibit Hall and run into a certain celebrity chef or two – ahem Giada & Anne Burrell.

But more on the intricacies of the conference later – I’ll just tell you all – PLEASE, do all you can to score yourself a ticket to this conference – I’m cannot emphasize enough how amazing it is and how exhilarating and inspiring it is for us librarians!

Follow along over the next few posts as I take you through MY journey at BEA 2013!

Your very own Personal Learning Network

So with all of these social networks out there, you’re bound to hear the phrase Personal Learning Network. And maybe at first glance you think, “wait, ANOTHER network I need to join?”  - but no, this isn’t its own website like Twitter or Facebook or LinkedIn – this is a group of people who help you on a professional level to learn various things. And in my experience, a majority of the interactions are online via social media sites. Although it’s a bonus if you get some face to face interaction!  

So how can YOU get yourself a Personal Learning Network? 

Get out there! Sign up for a Twitter account (it took me months to finally relent and stop thinking it was silly and who wanted to hear what I had to say!? ), create a Facebook page, and most importantly, INTERACT on them – the interaction is the key element to maintaining your PLN. 

But HOW do you do it? How do you manage the time to be on these sites and establish a relationship with fellow professionals? 

Well…there are several different ways to go about it – you can dedicate an hour or so to it each day – after all it *can* be considered work related since you *are* building your network professionally. Or, you could concentrate on it on your off hours at home. Whatever you do – if you create an account, and you realize that you can’t spend the time necessary to get out of it what you want, don’t be afraid to delete that account and try something else that you can handle and maintain – in my opinion there’s nothing worse than finding someone on Twitter to discover that their last tweet was 3 months ago – I mean really – why bother.

Once you’re online, work on creating a reputation for yourself – follow others – post articles relevant to your industry, and join in on chats (twitter is famous for their various chats, varying from readers advisory to author chats in the library field). And most of all – have FUN – you never know who you will meet and who you will teach and learn from! 

Here is a great article that goes a bit more into depth about PLNs if you want to take a peek

And this article talks about social media in schools - which is another spin on the PLN

It's all about the trends

I recently read this article http://bit.ly/WaFjxh , and it got me to thinking – is your library a trendsetter or a trend follower?

As it is in libraryland, things tend to change in the blink of an eye – new devices are constantly being rolled out, software is being updated, eBooks and publishing houses are changing terms hither and thither, and then there are our patrons wanting to learn the latest and greatest of EVERYTHING. 

And what are libraries to do but … 

Keep up …

Right? 

And how DO you do it? How do you make sure that your staff is aware of ALL the new things going on relevant to libraries?

Do you have an Emerging Technologies committee who work together to keep an eye out for the trends?

Do you have a sole digital initiatives librarian who works to implement things BEFORE they are hot – in essence, a trend SETTER? 

Or do you just follow along as best you as you can and jump on the bandwagon when you start seeing things like maker spaces, technology fairs, new iPad Mini and Kindle HD+ pop up online and in libraries? 

I think that the core of all of these trends should be YOUR patrons … every library has their own community of patrons – weather you’re in an urban library where your branches are mere blocks apart, or a more rural library where each town is its own system.  

I think that libraries need to really analyze THEIR patrons – throw some surveys up their websites, run some stats in your ILS – let the PATRONS tell you what THEY want. Don’t necessarily fall in line with the trends just because they’re hot -  because as soon as they’re hot … they’re …. Not. 

How do you handle the hustle and bustle of the new and emerging technologies in the library field?