Advocating for All Libraries: Saving the Library Ecosystem

I attended this session, which was developed by ALA President-Elect Jim Rettig. Jim's two presidential initiatives will be outreach and inreach. Outreach involves the difficult task of getting people's attention, while inreach entails communicating and sharing with all libraries, whether school, public, academic, or special. Ideally, the libraries should all be part of a shared library ecosystem that will have strong, integrated programs. When this happens, the benefits will be far-reaching for patrons, libraries, and librarians.

The breakout sessions dealt with four topics:

Commonalities in Library Advocacy: Getting the Message Out
(Who are our audiences and how do we reach them?)

Creating Best Practices of Successful Collaborations
(How do we obtain and share information about what's happening around the country?)

Finding Solutions
(Identifying the obstacles and ways to overcome them)

Creating Connections that Stick: Shaping the 2008-2009 Year
(What can we do to affect change in the upcoming year?)

Jim Rettig will be utilizing the collected information and ideas to help carry-out his outreach and inreach initiatives during his upcoming term as ALA President.

The ultimate goal is to sustain and develop advocacy efforts on behalf of ALL libraries; the recently created ALA Advocacy Office will be another tool that can be used to help integrate diverse advocacy efforts throughout all divisions of ALA.