Highlighting the potential of web 2.0

Dr Robert Pymm speaking at the National Library of Australia Originally uploaded by CSU Information Studies.

Dr Robert Pymm and Jake Wallis recently organised, chaired and presented (phew - long day!) at a professional development seminar at the National Library of Australia on the potential of web 2.0 for information services. With the registration having filled within about 20 minutes of the rego form going online, this was a popular event!

Given the demand for the event from across Australia, we arranged for the audio to be recorded on the day so that it could be podcast after the event. So, for all of you who couldn't make it, the presentations, including audio, are available at http://www.nla.gov.au/initiatives/meetings/web2prog.html Enjoy!

Damian and Bob @ ALIA Lib Techs 2007

Damian and Bob @ ALIA Lib Techs 2007 Originally uploaded by CSU Information Studies.

Damian Lodge and Bob Pymm (pictured here looking a little nervous before giving their paper) attended the ALIA Library and Information Technician's Conference held in Melbourne in October. The Conference attracted around 400 people and was a mix of good, interesting and often practical papers; some great visits and a hectic social whirl. Photos from the Conference dinner, held at the Melbourne Aquarium have had to be held back due to their potential for embarassment!

Anne Lloyd, also from the School of Information Studies at CSU, also attended and gave the keynote address on the last day and, considering it was the Friday morning after the dinner, did a great job at keeping people awake with her story of welders in the TAFE library and her subsequent 'research' with firemen!

'The Librarians' airs on ABC

Last night ABC's new comedy series 'The Librarians' aired with its first episode. Funny(ish) seems to be the consensus. Needs time to gain momentum. There were some good moments mixed in with 'The Office' style awkwardness.

Of primary importance to most librarians I know was how the profession would be portrayed. Would it be the cardigan-wearing shushers or the buns and spectacles behind the desk stamping books? I'm relieved to say that there were no cardies to be seen.

The creators have done their best to reassure us that the only cardies to appear in the series will be trendy ones.....

Lyn Hay wins ALSA Citation Award for 2007

The School of Information Studies' Lyn Hay has won the Australian School Library Association Citation award for 2007.

The Australian School Library Association presents this award "for outstanding leadership in promoting and developing teacher librarianship in one or more of the following fields: policy formation, program implementation, publications, administration of the association, research, innovation and education. The award was presented to Lyn at the awards ceremony held during the very recent ASLA 2007 conference in Adelaide. Lyn has given outstanding service and leadership to school libraries in Australia and receives this award for the areas of education, publications, research and innovation. Her vision has had ongoing positive consequences for the profession of teacher librarianship across Australia" (Karen Bonanno, ASLA Executive Officer, OZTL_NET message).

You can read the citation and Lyn's acceptance speech on the ASLA website.

Photo credit: Australian School Library Association at http://www.asla.org.au/advocacy/citation/citation2007.htm

Study group visit to Melbourne Museum Discovery Centre

James Herring recently took one of our study visit groups to the fascinating Melbourne Museum Discovery Centre. James reports below......

The visit was excellent with the centre manager (a librarian by any other name) introducing the work of the centre as a focus for education but also as a gateway to the museum for inquiries and identifications. This means that people send in photos of beasties for the museum to identify. In some cases, people send specimens and sometimes, the specimens e.g. spiders, are still alive.

Students were then split into groups and each group was given an artefact e.g. a sheep’s skull or a shell and they had to go and use the centre’s displays, collection (i.e. drawers of fossils, bones etc), book collection and catalogue on the centre’s website, to identify the artefact - a real live information retrieval exercise, enjoyed by all.

There was also a chameleon in a glass case which was fascinating to watch – see James' blog for a link to a photo of the chameleon in the centre.

If you’re in Melbourne, it’s a fascinating – and free – place to visit.

Perth workshops for Teacher Librarians

James Herring Originally uploaded by CSU Information Studies.

James Herring recently led 2 workshops for teacher librarians in Perth at the invitation of the AISWA Libraries group. The workshops were focused on:

• the role of the teacher librarian


• the implications for TLs of the new WACE courses being introduced at year 11/12 in WA schools
  
• Advanced searching in Google and other search tools and a look at visual search engines such as Kartoo


• Web 2.0 and schools

As a follow up to the last session, James constructed a wiki for the participants.

James found Perth to be a very attractive, clean and very green city – not only the beautiful parks surrounding the river but the running/walking and cycling tracks which have been constructed all over the city and out to the beaches – all off the road.

Deep Thought

The School of Information Studies has a new photocopier/scanner/spaceship (ably piloted here by our Administration Officer, Lyndal).

It's amazing, it can do everything; photocopy, scan, update the blog (almost).

Hong Kong Library Education and Career Forum 2007

Dr John Mills in Hong Kong Originally uploaded by CSU Information Studies.

At the recent Hong Kong Library Education and Career Forum the partnership between the School of Information Studies at Charles Sturt University and the School of Professional and Continuing Education at Hong Kong University was represented by Dr John Mills.

The partnership is long running and successful, with many library and information professionals in Hong Kong attracted to this accredited course, recognised in Australia, Canada, the USA and UK.

ALIA InfoLit Forum turns 6 with a competition

ALIA Information Literacy Forum is turning 6!

The ALIA Information Literacy Forum is celebrating is 6th birthday! The forum was established in 2001 as one of the many new ALIA groups. In the last six years the forum has been involved in a number of exciting initiatives including the launch of the Advocacy Kit in 2003 and the IL satellite workshop at the 2006 New Librarians' Symposium. We have decided to celebrate our 6th birthday with a "mini makeover". The ALIA Information Literacy Forum committee is inviting you to help rename the group by hosting a renaming competition. The entry with the winning name will receive a $50 Borders book voucher.

The competition deadline is Monday August 13 2007 with the winning entry to be announced in August. Entries should be emailed to the group convenor Helen Partridge at helen.partridge@alia.org.au. Further details can be found on the group's website http://www.alia.org.au/groups/infolit/

Information Architecture post @ Victorian Dept of Justice

We've been contacted by the Dept. of Justice in Victoria who are keen to take on someone in an information architecture role (not necessarily with experience) - job description attached. I'm quoting below:

"We are advertising a taxonomist position at present and would welcome applications from information architecture graduates. [snip] I'd like to emphasise that we would be very open to applications from people who don't have much practical work experience, but whose theoretical grounding is strong. Because it is a specialist role, we want to encourage as many applicants as possible.

We do need candidates to be able to demonstrate good communication skills, as a key part of the role is communication with business unit content owners and the ability to educate content managers about taxonomies. The current closing date for the position is this Friday, but I'd also be open to late applications if I'd spoken to any interested candidates."

The contact for those interested is:
Juliette Cox
Tel: [03] 8684 1599
Fax: [03] 8684 1579
Project Manager, Taxonomy Management
Innovation Knowledge and StrategyStrategic Projects and Planning Division
Email: juliette.cox@justice.vic.gov.au