Latest about RDA

Latest about RDA

RDA, which stands for Resource Description and Access, is the new international descriptive cataloguing standard that will replace AACR2 in 2009.

The full draft of RDA is currently available for review and comment on the JSC website. http://www.collectionscanada.gc.ca/jsc/rdafulldraft.html
RDA is expected to be released in 2009, with implementation occurring during 2010.

The Australian Committee on Cataloguing (ACOC) has established a section about RDA on their website, which provides a range of information about RDA implementation in Australia, such as FAQs, information about scheduled training courses, and links to relevant articles. http://www.nla.gov.au/lis/stndrds/grps/acoc/rda.html

An Australian email discussion list on RDA, hosted by the National Library of Australia, provides Australian libraries with a mechanism for asking questions about the RDA draft as well as implementation issues. Information about subscribing to the list is also available on the ACOC website.

Catherine Argus, NLA

Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade -New H V Evatt Library space

On 6 November, the Secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, Mr Michael L’Estrange AO, officially opened the new H V Evatt Library space in the R G Casey Building in Canberra. For the past two years, library services were temporarily relocated to a smaller facility within the Department and the emphasis of library services adjusted to highlight on-line resources.

The library’s services and functions were also reviewed during this time and the library’s role in the future operations of the Department given careful consideration. A review of client needs indicated that, even in the digital age, there was a need for a physical library space, where officers could browse for information, access it in the most appropriate format, be it print, digital or audiovisual and read into issues in more depth when required, away from the immediate demands of their desk environment. The new library space meets these needs.

When opening the new library space, the Secretary emphasised the continuing relevance of the library to the goals and operations of the Department.

Mr L’Estrange noted that the specialist knowledge of the Department’s library staff ensured that the library would continue to deliver a service which would serve the specific needs of the Department in the digital age. The new library, he said, would be an important attribute for the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT) in years to come. It would offer DFAT officers services to meet their working needs in the twenty first century.
The new space is the start of the revitalisation of the library. Our newly created brand is used in the new space and also features on our new borrowers cards and promotional coasters in use throughout the Department and at overseas posts. In addition the intranet site is being totally revamped. We are exited about the library’s evolution and look forward to a positive future.

ALIAActive Midwinter dinner

This years Midwinter dinner actually occurred in early spring at the Canberra Institute of Technology restaurant on 19 September. We had a good turnout of about 50-60 librarians gathered to celebrate the years achievements and to enjoy congenial fellowship with their colleagues from all sectors. The food was good and the company pleasant.

Our keynote speaker was Stuart Ferguson who has recently taken up the post of Senior Lecturer in Librarianship at the University of Canberra. Stuart spoke of his experiences as professional librarian across three countries, Scotland, South Africa and Australia working in a variety of libraries from public to academic. Stuart moved on to speak about the structure of the new postgraduate course in librarianship. He said that the purpose of the course is to nurture future librarian managers and related professionals so they can best serve their career needs and those of their parent organisations.

Review of Masters in Library and Information Course at Charles Sturt University : Progress report

I was very fortunate to be a member of the Course Advisory Committee of the Masters in Library and Information Course at Charles Sturt University (CSU) last year. I am delighted to advise that while the committee challenged CSU to not just have timely quality courses for students , but also to evolve course content very quickly, particularly to ensure that students were au fait with Web 2.0, CSU have responded to these challenges very positively.

Dr Philip Hider has recently advised the Course committee that:

"We did have a meeting last July to discuss the recommendations made in last year's report on the MASLIM course, but the inception of the School Review shortly afterwards meant that we had to defer the broader plan of action, as it was likely that the Review's outcomes would have overarching implications for the course. Whilst these outcomes have yet to be finalised, it does look as though this will indeed be the case.

Nevertheless, some of the more detailed recommendations provided in the report have been implemented. For instance, regarding 'information infrastructure' and IT elements, a thorough revision to the subject INF413, IT in Libraries, has been undertaken (it has also been moved online), and also a major revision of INF439, Online Information Environment, in which new IT elements have been introduced (such as Web 2.0 type software)."

In INF410, Information Seeking in Context, there is now greater emphasis on user-centred services and on use of virtual reference services. The treatment of user education more directly, however, is likely to be reserved for a dedicated Information Literacy subject, either in terms of a revised ETL412 or a new subject.

The management subjects underwent an extensive overhaul last year, with the three subjects INF415 (stage 1), INF514 (stage 2) and INF515 (stage 2), now covering the topics proposed both under 'contemporary workplace issues' and in the 'intensive business focussed' area.

The subject INF429, Introduction to Information Society, has also undergone a major revision, and been moved online. Addressing a specific recommendation, there is now a segment on user-generated content, the re-use of digital content and the idea of ‘free culture’ (i.e. more flexible usage around copyright).

I would like to congratulate CSU on both providing excellent graduates for the Canberra region and also for their great engagement with employers in many sectors including public, university, tafe and special, to ensure that their course meet our needs.

If anyone would like to discuss the course review with me please do not hesitate to contact me.

Roxanne Missingham
Parliamentarian Librarian

What's new on the ABS website?

Catch up with recent changes to the ABS website:

You can now ask for help or submit questions to the Australian Bureau of Statistics via an online form.

(Or call our free information service for assistance on 1300 135 070).

Every page on the ABS website now includes a Bookmark button .You can automatically bookmark a page to your Favourites/Bookmarks on your browser or your preferred service. There are over 30 options including Delicious, Facebook, Twitter and Furl. Find local area data via the National Regional Profile. These have been updated with a new look, extra help and more data. Use these profiles to find data not elsewhere available on the ABS website.

An online tutorial for accessing Basic Community Profile data is now available. This is the first in a series of tutorials designed to assist in navigating and understanding Census data and information. The 2008 edition of Australian Social Trends has been released. This publication provides information on a wide range of current social issues. Also included are sets of summary tables of key social indicators providing an overview of social change over the past decade.

Nicola Cross
Information Skills Program
Australian Bureau of Statistics

Information Awareness Month (IAM) - Gala Dinner

Information Awareness Month (IAM), Gala Dinner was held on the 29 May 2008.

This year's events for IAM saw a record number of ACT events for Information Awareness Month. A Gala Dinner hosted by the ACT IAM Committee was held at the Canberra Club on 29 May to close IAM 2008.

IAM is a collaborative event between like bodies within the records, archives, library and information management community and this commonality of purpose reflects the fact that the various bodies are recognised as some of the most widely respected professional bodies in the information management community.

The Guest Speaker was Brand Hoff the founder of Tower Software who spoke of his experiences during many years in the Information management community. A number of companies such as Iron Mountain, Recall, Oraicle and Icognition sponsored tables and Tower Software provided drinks for the dinner. Organisations such as ALIA, NAA, AGLIN and ASA also hosted tables at the dinner.

The dinner provided an opportunity to network with colleagues, clients and be part of the closing event for another successful Information Awareness Month. A good time was had by all and the
event is sure to be on the ACT IAM calendar for 2009.

Kym Holden
DEEWR Library Manager

ACT ALIA and AGLIN groups information event - CSU: Developments in learning commons

Learning commons-developments at Charles Sturt University

Shirley Oake, University Librarian at Charles Sturt University gave a marvellous presentation to the ACT ALIA and AGLIN groups onWednesday 28 May.

She covered the many issues involved in establishing physical and online learning commons which are spaces that enable students to interact with each other and the learning spaces using technology to provide support. It evolved from "Information commons" which started out more likeextensions of computer laboratories and responds to:* Changes in the way students behave* Changes in the way they learn* Changes in the way they are taughtA very interesting concept paper can be found online at http://www.csu.edu.au/division/library/about/commons/ and the implementations in Bathurst and Albury (Thurgoona) have led to significantly increased use of the spaces and online resources.

Roxanne Missingham
Parliamentarian Librarian

Information Awareness Month Opening Night 2008

As the ALIAActive Convener I was invited to attend the opening night of 2008 Information Awareness Month (IAM) at the National Archives of Australia (NAA). Ross Gibbs the National Archivist opened the month for IAM. I felt privileged to be there as I had only participated in the committee that organised IAM in a very desultory way. The overall opening night was illuminating because of the diverse range of information management groups attending such as ALIA, AGLIN, the Records Management Association of Australasia (RMAA), the Institute of Information Management (IIM), the Australian Society of Archivists (ASA) and actKM.

Each convener was called upon to give a brief summary of what their group is about, how it helps and promotes information professionals and what they were offering as their contributions to IAM. All such group events were listed on the IAM calender. I was interested to see the wide range of seminars and workshops offered such as the AGLIN/ALIA Information Sharing Forum on the Learning Commons presented by Shirley Oakley the University Librarian of Charles Stuart University and the actKM world cafe event.

We were pleased to learn that the NAA has become housed as one of Prime Minister and Cabinet (PM&C) portfolio agencies, a better placement for its government recordkeeping focus and heritage function along with other public accountability agencies such as the National Audit Office. Treasury and the like. The opening session was followed by supper and a change to network with others interested in promoting information management. I wish to thank the NAA and in particular Mathew Eggins for all his efforts in organising opening night.

How many library people in your suburb?

Are you curious to know how many librarians, library assistants, or library technicians were recorded as living in your local suburb during the 2006 Census?

Find out using the Census Tables product on the ABS website: www.abs.gov.au/census

5 Easy Steps:
1. select 'View Census Tables by Topic'
2. choose the topic 'Occupation'
3. select the option 'Occupation by Sex - 2006 ANZSCO Alternative View: Culture and Leisure Occupations'
4. click the 'Select Location' button and type your suburb name into the search box
5. click the 'View Census Tables' button and open the Excel table under the 'Details' tab.

Information Awareness Month

May is Information Awareness Month:

the purpose of Information Awareness Month (IAM) is to increase public awareness of the breadth of the information industry through a series of events all through the month of May.

Information Awareness Month has grown into a collaborative event between various bodies within the records/archiving/information management community. ALIA is one of the contributing organisations.

IAM 2008 was launched at the National Archives of Australia by the Director-General of the NAA, Ross Gibbs, on the 1 May. Since then many & varied events have been taking place around Canberra, including breakfasts, seminars, world cafe discussions, and more. Check the events listing for next week's upcoming activities.

Farewell to Sandra Henderson

Sandra Henderson retires in mid-April after more than 30 years service with the National Library. During this time Sandra’s career has moved through many phases. From a beginning in the Library’s then specialist science section, Sandra has worked across a broad range of functions and leaves the Library a much valued member of staff.

After completing a Bachelor of Science at the Australian National University and a Graduate Diploma in Librarianship at the Canberra College of Advanced Education, Sandra started at the National Library in early 1977 as a science reference librarian. In 1978 she moved to the Life Sciences Section, which provided a MEDLARS search service for Australian health professionals, and participated in the development of the Australian MEDLINE Network. This was real ‘pioneer’ work and Sandra’s strong IT capabilities came to the fore at this stage.

As the MEDLINE Network expanded, Sandra took on roles in training, customer helpdesk support, indexing and newsletter editing, and became the Principal Librarian of the section in 1983. In the following years APAIS and ANB were added to the Section’s responsibilities and in the early 1990s the focus shifted to the production of APAIS and AMI. It was during this time that Sandra acquired significant expertise in indexing and she remains an active member of the Australian and New Zealand Society of Indexers.

Soon after the indexing services moved to the Library’s Collections Management Division in 2000, Sandra moved to a position in the Coordination Support Branch within the Executive area of the Library, where her responsibilities included national and international liaison, for example providing support for bodies such as the Australian Library Collections Task Force and the Conference of Directors of National Libraries. In recognition of her dedicated work in this area, Sandra was awarded a National Library staff Australia Day Award in 2006. More recently, she has organised a number of Australian and international conferences held at the Library, managed the Libraries of Asia Pacific website and been the project manager for the initial stages of the Library’s rights management project.

Sandra will be greatly missed when she retires. Over the years she has acquired an in-depth knowledge of Library activities and is able to turn her hand to any task. She embodies the word 'professional', and those outside the Library who have worked on conferences, seminars, visits and many other things besides, attest to her abilities through their letters and emails of thanks.
In retirement Sandra will pursue her interests in birdwatching, indexing and gardening.

Jasmine Cameron Assistant Director-General, Executive & Coordination Support – NLA

(This article was published in, Gateways, Number 92, April 2008)

Accessing ABS Information

Libraries often need to respond to statistical queries and locate data for clients. The Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) has a vast range of data available free on its website: http://www.abs.gov.au/, but it can be difficult to locate the information you need.

There is a range of help available for library and information staff:

• the ABS offers free introductory sessions. The latest Accessing ABS Information seminar at ABS House in Belconnen on the 2nd April 2008 was attended by over 60 people from a range of sectors. A hands-on workshop will be offered in the coming months, details will be posted to the ABS Training Calendar soon.
• the ABS Services for Libraries webpages provide more information and resources for library staff (access via the 'Services we provide' link on the homepage)
• keep up-to-date with the latest ABS information and tips for finding data via the ABS blog for librarians: Statistically Speaking
• if you can't find what you need on the website: contact the free National Information and Referral Service for assistance - phone 1300 135 070.

For any further information contact Nicola Cross: nicola.cross@abs.gov.au

Information Sharing Forums

ALIA / AGLIN Information Sharing Forums are a great way to learn about new initiatives in other libraries, share knowledge, and maintain your professional development. The forums are organised jointly by ALIA and AGLIN (the Australian Government Libraries Information Network) and usually held at the National Library. ISFs are presented on a diverse range of topics, and are an excellent opportunity to meet and network with a wide range of people in the ACT library & information sector. Everyone is welcome.

The next forum promises to be a highly interesting session, with Shirley Oakley, the Executive Director of Library Services at Charles Sturt University giving a talk on 'Meeting the needs of the 21st Century learner: the learning commons concept at Charles Sturt University'. This forum will be held 4.30pm, Wednesday 28th May, at the National Library Conference Room. For further information check the AGLIN Events & Training page.

Nicola Cross, Information Sharing Forums Contact Officer:
a bit about me: I currently work at the Australian Bureau of Statistics, as part of the ABS Information Skills Program (which incorporates the Library Extension Program). I am a member of the AGLIN Training & Development taskforce and have previously also worked at the University of Canberra Library and Canberra Institute of Technology. If you have any questions about upcoming ISFs, or suggestions for speakers or topics please get in touch with me: nicola.cross@abs.gov.au

Vale Peter Sinfield (1950 – 2008)

Peter Sinfield (1950 – 2008)

Peter, who passed away from cancer on 25 March 2008, had worked as a librarian at the Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) for 13 years prior to his retirement at the end of 2006.

Peter was born in Melbourne on 27 February 1950. At the tender age of 15 he joined the Royal Australian Navy as a radio apprentice. He served in a number of ships, including the HMAS Sydney in its role as the Vung Tau Ferry on supply visits to Vietnam, and HMAS Hobart, his sentimental favourite. His naval service also saw him in Darwin helping the clean-up after Cyclone Tracey. During his naval career he became a qualified teacher and he was an instructor at HMAS Leeuwin, and later a recruitment officer. He reached the rank of Lieutenant Commander.

Prior to retiring from the Navy, Peter studied librarianship at the Canberra College of Advanced Education (now the University of Canberra), obtaining a Graduate Diploma in 1989. He then commenced a career as a librarian, working in a variety of government libraries in Canberra. He started at the Department of Health, Housing and Community Services, moving to ATSIC and then the Australian Customs Service, before commencing at the ANAO in 1993, followed by some short stints at the Therapeutic Goods Administration and the Department of Veterans’ Affairs.

Peter and I became work colleagues when I commenced at the ANAO in 1994 as a cataloguer and systems librarian – he was by then a well respected and knowledgeable reference librarian.

In 1997, Peter was acting Library Manager when the ANAO library underwent a major review and restructure in 1997. He oversaw the implementation of the review’s recommendations, which saw the library change its name (to the Information Research Centre), location (from the 3^rd to the 2^nd floor) and focus (from traditional collection based services to more research-oriented services utilising electronic resources). The library review also saw the abolition of the library manager position and a change in our roles, with both of us providing research services and co-managing the library. Peter generously shared with me his corporate knowledge and reference skills, and helped me to morph from a cataloguer and systems librarian into a “research librarian”. His professionalism and amiability also ensured our unorthodox partnership endured until his retirement.

Outside of the ANAO, Peter was active in the Australian Government Libraries Information Network, and the Military History Society of Australia. He helped produce the Society’s journal Sabretache for many years, and also organised the annual HMAS Canberra memorial service.

In his younger years, his transport of choice was motorbikes. As a responsible family man he had stopped riding, but the yearning remained. In his mid fifties he purchased a motorbike and joined the Ulysses Club. His wife supported him in this aim to “grow old disgracefully” and bought a large motor scooter to join him on the road.

Towards the end of 2005 he started to plan for, and look forward, to his retirement, giving himself and the ANAO a year’s notice. Things went slightly awry in February 2006, when on a regular weekend ride Peter uncharacteristically came off his motorbike on a gravel road. Medical investigations revealed that he was suffering from something more serious than just abrasions and cracked ribs. After a major operation for cancer, he spent several months convalescing at home before returning to work and seeing out his plan to retire in December 2006.

Unfortunately 2007 saw a recurrence of the cancer, and Peter had little opportunity to enjoy his retirement or motorbike, between medical appointments and further treatments.

He is survived by his mother and brother, wife Sylvia, daughter Patricia and son Andrew.

Vale Peter! A great librarian and human being.

Christine Herrmann

Research Librarian

A Quick look at the Innovative Ideas Forum

Innovative Ideas Forum, National Library, 10 April, 2008.

Last week I attended the Innovative Ideas forum, for 2008, held at the NLA. The theme for this year was Web Archiving and there were a number of interesting and sometimes fun presentations. I thought I would give a very brief overview of the day, and provide a few URLs for people to follow up, if they wish.

The first talk was by Professor Gerard Goggin, from University of NSW, talking about the creation of history of the internet and the mobile phone. It is amazing to think that people are starting to write histories of these applications already. This presentation was highly academic, but it was one of the few which addressed the mobile phone issue. Kris Carpenter Negulescu discussed the Internet Archive in the US, discussing what they do and their holdings, currently running at 4 petabytes of information (2 x50 bytes or 10x15 bytes) , taking 6 million downloads per day. They hold 110 billion URLs, including 380 thousand books, images, moving images, open audio, and NASA images, and 1 million YouTube items. They are identifying the existing and emerging trends on the visible web, not including the hidden web and cyber scholarship .The hidden web refers to university libraries, university websites, government organisation websites, non- government organisation websites and academic and scholarly websites, which are not readily available on search engines such as Google. The URL for the Internet Archive is below.

Richard Walis gave an entertaining and professional presentation entitled Beyond Web 2.0 discussing the global semantic web platform, covering 2000-2010, which has developed a set of attributes eg, wikkis, RSS, blogs, social networking , and tagging- who knows what new developments there will be in the next few years? (The Semantic Web is an evolving extension of the World Wide Web in which the semantics of information and services on the web is defined, making it possible for the web to understand and satisfy the requests of people and machines to use the web content. From Wikipedia) .
He predicts there will be more interactive sites, participative sites and more mashups- machine talking to machine interaction. He noted that Google’s success over other search engines lay in its ability to use the network effect, site 1 points to site 2 etc, a hierarchy of sites and importance of sites which register more hits.
According to Walis, the way to break down silos on the web is to use the semantic web, which allows you to query across separate silos and use networks. This will enable massive social and economic shifts.

National Archives of Australia ex- staff member, David Pearson, and his colleague Douglas Elford, from the NLA , gave a presentation on the Mediapedia, which has been designed to identify various types of media and evaluate it, as to whether not to keep it. It’s usage is internal at this stage, for the use of the NLA digital preservation and collection areas. Classification systems they have used in its development have included Dublin Core & AACR 2 . They use the following classes _ genre, process, carrier, and name. For more information, see digitalpres@nal.gov.au

Stewart Wallace gave a brief overview of a project currently underway in Sydney, called The Dictionary of Sydney. This project is building a digital repository of text and multimedia related to Sydney’s history. The repository is designed to facilitate a variety of attributes including web, mobile, and RSS. In seeking the best method of connecting these resources to Sydney’s urban history, the dictionary project team is developing an accompanying semantic model of terms to create an extensible web of digital connections.
See http://www.dictionary/ of Sydney.org for more project details.

The next speaker, Julien Masanes, is the director of the European Archive Foundation . He spoke on the Next generation web archiving methods. The library holds his book, listed below, Web archiving.
He discussed the Living Web Archives project, which has been funded by the European Union. This project will carry web archiving into the next generation of the web, and will develop a range of services and technology for cultural institutions. It provides weekly snapshots of websites, simple client view archiving, abstract storage /identification, browsing and basic searching, and institution - centric access.
The archive looks at a site from the client’s view using the spider/crawler, capturing the site page by page. It stores items in containers, which have proved to be efficient and compressible. Searching is simple, by URL. The problem they have identified is that this paradigm doesn’t make a memory of the web, it is a frozen snapshot, and it doesn’t yet capture the interactive nature of the web. http://www.liwa-project.eu/

This brings us to the final presentation, which was a lot of fun and quite exciting.
Gordon Mohr from the Internet Archive addressed the challenges of future archiving of the web, looking at spam, malware, desktop Web 2.0, social networks, and virtual worlds. For a detailed analysis of the effects of malware, see the paper by Peter Gutmann , from the University of Auckland, who gloomily comments that as malware develops all you can do is “kiss your *** goodbye”… Google however does provide safe browsing lists which are reliable.

To attempt to archive social networks, Mohr suggests that to gain access to these previously open activities which are moving into private areas and friend networks, we could use an android harvester or android assistant to go in and ask to be a friend, and then be able to archive interaction with permission.

To archive virtual worlds is a challenge, particularly since these activities are replacing other communications (in his opinion), and are very popular, replacing popular and children’s literature. You could use the trusty android to go “in- world” into 2nd Life.
Another quandary flagged was the access conditions if you want to archive personal correspondence on interactive sites, eg Face Book or other social networking sites.
See the Internet Archive at : http://www.archive.org/index.php
To find out what some of this techno babble means, see the following books:

Masanes, Julien, Web archiving, 2006, 005.7 WEB
Jones, Dennis, How to do everything with the internet, 2001 004.678 JON
Henniger, Maureen, The hidden web , 2003 004.678 HEN

By, Beth Rogers, NAA

Innovative Ideas Forum

Innovative Ideas Forum

On 10 April the National Library hosted its third Innovative Ideas Forum. This year the Forum coincided with the meeting in the Library of the International Internet Preservation Consortium. This presented the opportunity to invite some IIPC members to make presentations to the Forum.

The program for the event, with links to powerpoint and audio files from the day, is online at http://www.nla.gov.au/initiatives/meetings/InnovativeIdeas2008program.html.

Professor Gerard Goggin from the University of New South Wales, spoke on the Internet and mobile phone, and the phenomenon of mobile technology. Kris Carpenter, from the Internet Archive, gave a very interesting presentation on the work of the Archive and the future of digital services.

Richard Wallis, from TALIS in the UK, entertained greatly with his lively presentation style. He said there is still some way to go in fully utilising web technologies in libraries, and a number of the following presenters referred back to his discussion of the semantic web.

Several National Library speakers gave short presentations on some rapid prototyping projects underway at the Library. Comments from delegates after the event indicated that they particularly enjoyed the presentation by Mark Triggs and Steve McPhillips, who gave a non-librarian perspective on a catalogue redevelopment they’ve been working on using VuFind. One of the delegates commented by email afterwards that “we need more honest reflection like this from OUTSIDE the profession and median age group - such cool insight and a model for us to think about”. If you want to try out the prototype Mark and Steve have been working on, go to the NLA catalogue and select the beta catalogue from the box at the top.

Stewart Wallace from the Dictionary of Sydney project outlined some of the ways information is being collected for this undertaking.

The final two speakers, like Kris Carpenter, were from the IIPC. Julien Masanès spoke about a European project, the Living Web Archives, which is working on ensuring the viability of web archiving into the future. Gordon Mohr of the Internet Archive addressed the challenges being faced by organisations such as the Internet Archive.

If you did not get a chance to attend, or you want to revisit the various presentations, please go to the web page above.

Sandra Henderson, National Library

AGLIN and ALIA working together - MOU

In March 2007, Mary Teague, as Executive Convenor, AGLIN and Sue Hutley as Executive Director ALIA signed a Memorandum of Understanding between the two organisations. The MoU will be reiewed after 2 years of operation and sees AGLIN and ALIA working together to advance the cause of government libraries and information services in Australia and to benefit government library and information sector and the people working in it.

AGLIN and ALIA will form an a alliance to work co-operatively and to collaborate in areas that –
· Are of mutual benefit and interest
· Focus on the value of library services in general, and government libraries and information services in particular
· Focus on advocacy for the role and development of government libraries and information services in the Australian government.

The two organisations will also investigate reciprocity for membership of e-lists and e-newsletters, collaborate in lobbying, advocacy and profile raising and in the development of services and products that benefit the members of both organisations as well as offering reciprocal member rates for professional development programs and conferences.

Beth Rogers, Convener for ACT OPALS

I have been the convenor for the ACT OPALS for a couple of years now. In my library career, have always worked in small, one person libraries,and enjoy it mostly, for the flexibility and autonomy which it gives you. I like getting my own systems in place and running an efficient, personal and high profile library. I have always enjoyed excellent support from my directors and principals in my library positions.

As a one person librarian, I know that networking with colleagues isabsolutely vital. Previously, as a teacher librarian, I participated in various networking groups in Sydney and in Canberra and found it vital in discussing technology, and other operational issues, as well asmany other work related issues. Once I was established in my library here, I realised that I needed to be able to network with similar colleagues in government libraries, so went about starting a group, with the assistance of the Group's coordinators at ALIA.

I certainly appreciate the support I receive frommy ALIA colleagues and AGLIN colleagues, and I continue to make aneffort to keep the OPALS rolling along, to fill that networking and friendship need we have, since most of us work in organizations where weare the only ones, so no-one else really has any idea of what we do, orour daily issues. I hope to have a least one guest speaker this year, and am always on thelook out for events we can participate in.

Introducing Karna O'Dea, aliaACTive Convenor 2008

It was suggested to me that I should introduce myself as I am now taking over the role of aliaACTive convenor from Sherrey Quinn. Most of you already know of me from my role of the AGLIN Information Sharing Officer for the past 3 years. This function has now in the capable hands of Nicola Cross.

I currently work in the Metadata team at the Australian Bureau of Statistics. I have been involved with ALIA as an active member for the past 15 years. I believe you get out of an organisation what you put into it and decided to practice what I preach in this role. I have a very hard act to follow after Sherrey Quinn who kept aliaACTive going over a great number of years. I have asked Sherrey to stay on the ALIAActive committee to contribute her experience and commonsense approach and appreciate the efforts of all other committee members such as Dianne Walton-Sonda, Gaik Khong.

We have a full programme of Information Sharing Forums (ISFs) for you in the next six months and really value your suggestions for others. However I will leave it for Nicola to expand on this. I look forward to seeing more of you at our ISFs and other joint ventures. My philosophy for the aliaACTive convenor role is the African proverb, "if you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go with people.

Karna O'Dea
aliaACTive Convenor

Changes to ALIA ACT Executive

Changes to ALIA ACT executive:

A special thanks to Sherrey Quinn. While Sherrey will be continuing to work for the ACT ALIA group as a committee member and ALIA ACTive Awards Sub-Committee member, I thought it would be timely to note her outstanding and extensive service. Sherrey has been convenor of the ACT group for the past 2 years, taking up the role with gusto, following several years as secretary and treasurer. Sherrey is a quiet achiever, who has kept everything flowing in the background and, perhaps more importantly, has ensured that we have had a wide range of opportunities for ACT library staff to mingle, develop and to celebrate our achievements.Sherrey has made so many events work well for us in the ACT. She has made the annual dinner the place to be, has kept our contribution tonational ALIA planning alive through organising and contributing to NAC meetings and has passed the baton on to a younger generation (including the wonderful proactive editors). The time she has devoted to ALIA, particularly considering that she is in the private sector, istremendous.Sherrey has a wonderful range of skills which has made the ACT group hum along - her enthusiasm, ability to motivate her colleagues and herability to keep an eye on what needs to be done are outstanding. This year Sherrey's work was recognised with an ALIA fellowship, a very welldeserved reward.Sherrey thanks for everyone in the ACT and even more thanks for agreeing to keep contributing.RegardsRoxanne