We’re moving into a new month with great anticipation for the upcoming August 10-11 online conference, Trends in Library Training and Learning. In my communications with co-planners (thank you LearningRT!), presenters, members of the production team, and libraries arranging for viewing parties, I’ve come to realize that this online conference most certainly will be greater than the sum of its parts. This is WebJunction’s third online conference and building on experience, your and ours, and the ever-expanding modes of online and blended learning, here are some ways for all to benefit:
As presenters, emcees, producers, viewing party cohorts and all other participants, active or passive, gather around the online conference using these modes and means of engagement, you will see, we certainly do equal more than the sum of our parts. I look forward to learning with all of you!
Thank you to all who stopped by one of the Project Compass events at ALA! It was a busy weekend for all in New Orleans, so especially pleased to have shared so many of the new curriculum workbooks and other webjunction.org/workforce-resources at each of the events.
A special kudos to Bill Erbes, his director, Jill Rodriguez from the Bensenville Community Public Library District in Illinois, and Lindsey Wesson, Continuing Education Coordinator at the Tennessee State Library and Archives, for their fine work at the poster session Sunday afternoon. Here we are with the fantastic display Bill created!

As we chatted, Bill shared this great story of the Earlville Library (IL), who’s motto in these tough economic times is, “Heads up, shoulders back!”
Lindsey and I also set up a Project Compass table at the Learning Round Table Training Showcase. It was so busy I didn’t have time to take pictures, but look forward to seeing the video LearningRT superstar Maurice Coleman shot! There was lots of interest in the upcoming online workshop Libraries Supporting Small Business and Financial Health, kicking off on July 12 with a live online session, followed by 4 weeks of self-directed interactions facilitated by members of the Project Compass team. It’s not too late to register!
I wanted to thank folks again for nominating me as a Mover & Shaker. The gathering of newly minted M&S’s as well as alumni on Friday afternoon was a huge inspiration and included many librarians doing great work to support their community workforce development efforts. I had the great pleasure of sitting next to Jill Bourne who I worked with years ago at Seattle Public Library. She’s now deputy city librarian at San Francisco Public Library, our partners in another IMLS project, researching patron training tutorials. She shared that the project played a part in insuring successful funding for their library’s ongoing technology! Thanks to LJ’s Rebecca Miller for taking this nice photo.
I’m sorry if we missed you at ALA but look forward to hearing more about the great work your libraries are doing to support workforce development in your communities. Through Project Compass workshops and programs, libraries are learning new ways to:
Bring your stories, templates, resources, and ideas to the growing community on WebJunction’s Workforce Resources.
If you’re headed to New Orleans, we hope to see you at one of these ALA events that WebJunction staff will be attending to talk about Project Compass, the initiative funded by a grant from The Institute of Museum and Library Services focused on libraries guiding workforce recovery efforts.
BTOP and Libraries: Spotlight on Workforce
Saturday, June 25
10:30am – 12:00pm, Convention Center Rm 284
WebJunction’s Kendra Morgan will be joining members of this panel to discuss Project Compass. Libraries are playing an important role in the economic recovery by providing job readiness training, job-hunting and resume-writing support, and workshops for entrepreneurs.
Add to your conference schedule »
Putting Virtual Reference to Work: tips on providing career advice to online users
Saturday, June 25
4:00 – 5:30 pm, Hilton Riverside, Bridge Room
Job seekers and anyone needing career advice often find a visit to their local library pays off – especially when times are tough. Virtual reference services expand the reach of library reference services, allowing librarians to assist users wherever they are – from home, work, and even outside library open hours. This panel discussion will provide examples of how libraries use virtual reference to assist jobseekers and will share tips, resources and best practices in using virtual reference tools to help get people back to work. Panelists include:
Register for this and other OCLC Events »
Add to your conference schedule »
The 8th Annual Training Showcase: Best Practices in Training, Staff Development and Library Continuing Education
Sunday, June 26
1:30pm – 3:30pm, Convention Center, Rm 346-347
The training showcase is a poster session program celebrating innovative continuing education, staff development and training initiatives in all types of libraries and library organizations. Participants present best practices from their organization or institution. The Showcase planners are still taking applications for participants and sponsors so come join what’s always a highlight of the conference!
Jennifer will be set up to talk about and share resources from Project Compass. The initiative has been successfully implemented in a number of different ways, including the development of an adaptable workshop curriculum, online tools and webinar programming, all designed to help library staff provide programs and services that help their communities recover from the impact of tough economic times and to move from surviving to thriving. The growing set of related resources and the full curriculum are available on WebJunction in Workforce Resources.
Add to your conference schedule »
Workforce Recovery: The Project Compass Approach
Sunday, June 26
3:00-4:30, Convention Center, Booth 2556
And as a part of another poster session program Jennifer will join Project Compass trainers, Bill Erbes from the Bensenville Community Public Library District in Illinois, and Lindsey Wesson, Continuing Education Coordinator at the Tennessee State Library and Archives for a poster session highlighting the Project Compass training efforts nationwide. Part of “Infrastructure: Posters on Buildings and Equipment, Management, and Technology.”
Today’s press release brings news of what’s sure to be our best online conference yet! We’re teaming up with the ALA Learning Round Table to plan and produce our third online conference, Trends in Library Training and Learning: Developing Staff Skills for the 21st Century set for August 10-11.
The conference, to include eight one-hour sessions over two days, will be hosted using the WebEx web conferencing tool, which will provide attendees with easy online access to all live sessions and the ability to interact with other attendees and presenters using text-based chat. Registration will open by June 1 when full conference details are available on our Online Conferences page.
“Libraries are changing quickly and staff need more training than ever to navigate nimbly through change,”said Sharon Morris, ALA Learning Round Table President 2010-11. “This conference will help library trainers, managers and staff to find new ways to train, learn and keep up. The Learning Round Table members are excited to be working with WebJunction on this cutting-edge online conference.”
Jay Turner, a leader in developing creative e-learning solutions for libraries, will serve as keynote speaker for the conference. Mr. Turner serves on the Learning Round Table Board and is the training manager for the Gwinnett County Public Library until May 13. He will then become the new Director of Continuing Education for the Georgia Public Library Service. Mr. Turner was selected as an ALA Emerging Leader in 2008 and is also active in the Public Library Association.
Session presenters will provide practical solutions for libraries looking to implement both staff and patron training using innovative learning techniques that include formal and informal, and online and face-to-face methods. Topics will be particularly relevant to public libraries, but all library staff are welcome and encouraged to attend.
With tight training and travel budgets, this free conference provides library staff an easy and affordable opportunity to learn from and network with both the WebJunction and Learning Round Table communities. Anyone unable to attend the live sessions will be able to view the recorded presentations that will be archived on WebJunction.org after the conference. Full session archives from WebJunction’s two 2010 online conferences are also available to view on WebJunction.org.
My colleague Kendra and I attended the IMLS-sponsored WebWise 2011 Conference in Baltimore, which was focused on the topic of Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) in Education, Learning, and Research. The audience was an energizing blend of librarians (academic, school, state, public, museum, and special), scientists, artists, historians, ethicists, and government representatives. A few themes arose:
Thanks to all who attended the December online conference, Serving the 21st Century Patron, and special thanks to those who gave us their feedback in the post-conference survey.
Building on what attendees told us after last February’s conference, Technology Essentials 2010, we made some tweaks to the format for this one. But, our main goal was once again to provide a conference experience to those who can’t normally attend conferences due to budget issues or other resource constraints. And we also enjoy encouraging attendees to play with online learning, social tools, and to collaborate with colleagues from across the miles.
Some of the changes we made:
“REALLY enjoyed Battledecks with the presenters! I give them a lot of credit and it was a fun relaxing way (for the audience anyway) to end the webinar especially some of the silly chat.”
“All were good, but the Battledecks session was not as helpful to me as the rest.”
“I know you were trying out Battledecks. It did not work well in the webinar setting. Good job for trying something new.”
“Battledecks was a scream! Much Fun.”
“Battledecks was a new concept and I wish the overall explanation could have been a bit better (or maybe I needed to scrub out my ears more). Anyway, I caught on and it was a fun exercise to watch and comment.”
“Battledecks! It’s like an informal wrap-up of the whole conference…”
According to the survey responses, 95% of attendees agreed that the conference content was “relevant to my library”; 91% agreed that the content “will help me in my work”; 95% agreed that the content was “worth sharing with my colleagues.”

To make sure that we know what we are getting right, we asked respondents to list one thing they thought was done particularly well, and here are the top responses:
And as always, we wanted to hear where there could be improvements and these topped the list:
We asked what topics would be of interest for future conferences and here are the top 10 suggestions:
And there were lots of other great ideas and comments shared:
“Definitely felt like I was getting training “from the trenches”…I was being taught by people with experience practicing what they were preaching…not someone presenting a cookie-cutter class about something they’ve never done or even seen first-hand.”
“That we could tune in as a group or individually!”
“As the director of a library with no budget for continuing education and a small staff, I really appreciate these free webinars both for the content and the ease of use.”
“Conferences like this help me get beyond the day to day to see the bigger picture.”
With this valuable feedback, we plan to offer another, even better conference in the future on one or more of the topics you suggested. Stay in touch with Crossroads to learn about this and other events at WebJunction.
Serving the 21st Century Patron, the second WebJunction online conference, was a huge success! Thanks to all who attended and also to our presenters!
The archives for the 8 sessions are posted to the conference page. If you were unable to attend in person, please take advantage of the archived sessions.
Just a few highlights:
Thanks to all attendees for helping to make the conference a success. We’ll be sharing additional feedback from all involved after collecting post-conference survey results, so stay tuned. And for those of you unable to attend – check out the archives today!
You are invited to attend WebJunction’s second free online conference, Serving the 21st Century Patron, on December 1–2. Over the course of 8 sessions and with 11+ speakers, we’ll focus on the changing needs and evolving approaches related to customer service in
21st-century libraries. Be sure not to miss the final session, Battledecks, which challenges speakers to present an unknown set of slides—and the audience gets to choose the best result!
Space for the conference is limited, so register now. Staff are also encouraged to attend as a cohort under a single registration: not only does this allow more people to attend, but you benefit from face-to-face discussion, as your group convenes in a single room with the sessions projected. Members who did this at our first conference provided these tips for successful cohort attendance.
We’re gearing up for our 2-day online conference in December focused on Serving the 21st Century Patron and in addition to hosting 7 sessions with 11 outstanding presenters we’re experimenting with Battledecks. Peter Bromberg provides a nice definition of Battledecks on this Learning RT blogpost:
Battledecks is a fun improv exercise that challenges contestants to deliver a presentation on the fly using an unknown slidedeck containing random (and often hilarious) slides. The contestants are judged on their ability to create a coherent presentation that incorporates the slide content smoothly. Laughs and getting through all of the slides on time are a plus.
We’re excited to be bringing you an online version of Battledecks to wrap up the conference with some interesting twists:
We look forward to seeing you at the conference, for as few or as many of the sessions as you’re able to attend and as always, archives will be made available.
Last week, the joint conference of the Association for Rural and Small Libraries (ARSL) and the Association of Bookmobile and Outreach Librarians (ABOS) was held in Denver. More than 450 attendees from around the country made the trip to participate and hear from a great a group of presenters. The conference was kicked off by Andrea Berstler, Conference Planning Chair, sharing some responses that came through the ARSL listserv last year in response to the statement, “You know you’re a rural librarian when….”. The list brought claps and laughter from the audience and a lot of head nodding in agreement. So how exactly do you know you are a rural librarian? Here is the top 13 list:
13. Your library has a hitchin’ post.
12. You need to leave early to take your kids and their livestock to the 4-H weigh in.
11. Your bookmobile has had to wait for a flock of sheep to clear the road
10. You stop at yard sales to buy movies for the library.
9. A perfectly good excuse for being late to work is “there’s a skunk on my porch and I can’t get out”.
8. The only time you lock your car is in the summer, so that people won’t leave bags of squash in it.
7. FEMA requests that the bookmobile notify people in low-lying areas they need to evacuate within 24 hours.
6. You can correctly identify the farm implements you see on the road & the owners.
5. Patrons use your car as a bookdrop, within a 60 mile radius of the library.
4. There are two seasons: Hunting and Fishing.
3. Automotive repair manuals are filed under “landscaping”.
2. A patron wants to trade a dozen eggs or a freshly baked pie in lieu of paying a fine.
1. A patron has to pay for books he accidentally shot trying to shoot the possum he noticed in his living room.
Do you see yourself anywhere in this list?
WebJunction had a table at the conference to talk about our services and projects like and the response was great. So many people stopped by just to say thank you! We heard about how much they appreciate the webinars, the free resources, the online courses and the community that continues to grow each day. This is work that we are all really proud of, and we know that it couldn’t be done without the amazing community of library staff that make up our membership.
Since part of the conference also focused on bookmobile and outreach services, Colorado libraries from around the state brought their bookmobiles out for show and tell – the parking lot was an impressive sight:
Bookmobiles in the parking lot of the ARSL/ABOS Conference.
Thanks to everyone who stopped in to visit our table and for attending the WebJunction presentations at the conference. This was clearly a dedicated, hard working and enthusiastic group of professionals and we hope to see even more people next year!
Learn Better Together – Discover the potential of cohort-based learning
You’ve heard the saying, “two heads are better than one.” As we all take the journey as life-long continuous learners, this statement rings ever true. Earlier this month, Betha and I had the opportunity to explore this idea of learning together for the joint conference for Pacific Northwest Library Association & Washington Library Association. During our session (sponsored by WLA/WALT), Learn Better Together – Discover the potential of cohort-based learning, we introduced some of the characteristics of cohort-based learning:
Learners move together through a program/event.
Learners form a group identity and engage the power of relationships.
Learners are active, not passive.
Learners take control of their learning.
We then shared 4 examples of successful cohort-based learning. Roddenbery Memorial Library led a Library Internet Skills Cohort working to increase knowledge and use of the Internet and social media tools. The Arizona State Library facilitated a leadership skills cohort – Arizona Library Institute, Virtual Extension (ALIVE!), a leadership program to help front line staff excel in their job at the public library A group of librarians led the Kansas Web Conference Groupies Cohort – leveraging the 2010 Handheld Librarian Online Conference from their offices and with others in their state. WebJunction led web-conferencing and self-paced course creation cohorts helping WebJunction admins maximize the tools they had available.
Diving into a new idea or technology with others on your immediate team, in other branches or within your state is a great way to harness existing motivation and light the fire of excitement for others who aren’t quite sure what the fuss is all about. Whether stepping in to basic internet skills, developing leadership skills, exploring handheld technology or instructional design strategies for self-paced courses, cohort-based learning can build a momentum for learning that just doesn’t happen alone.
While no learning effort is, well, effortless there are some basic steps to take to build your own learning cohort. Start small. Ask a friend to explore a new topic with you and set a time once a week to discuss or explore. Then, build that idea out with the colleagues on your floor. Before you know it, not only are you building your skills you are also sharing ideas and building relationships with others that can take your work further than ever expected.
While headed over the border from Washington, headed to Victoria Canada last week (which is on an island btw) to attend the joint WLA/PNLA 2010 conference, most everyone I talked to was struck with the loveliness of it all. Sure, the logistics were a bit of a challenge to some extent. Also, everyone was keenly aware of and felt grateful and fortunate for being able to attend during these tough economic times. It all actually helped us appreciate being able to go more, and made us all extra eager to share what we saw and learned.

(What a view on the commute from Seattle to Victoria on the Clipper. Wow!)
Before I mention the competency learning goodness Betha and I got to be a part of, check out the wide variety of *ahem* unusual ribbons at the registration desk. Hanging a “My Ribbon Is Better Than Than Yours”, “Know It All”, “Politically Correct”, “I READ YOUR EMAIL”, “OCD”, “Been There, Done That” or “Worker Bee” on your name badge added some fun to the proceedings right off the bat. Too funny! Unexpected little things always add up to a rich conference experience, plus they are mostly just plain funny, so it seemed like the thing to share. ![]()

Aside from all that, the real highlight for me at WLA/PNLA was being able to present to a live audience about Library Competencies with our very own Betha Gutsche (shown in that session presenting below).
Our Friday session was a great back and forth with lots of practical info for attendees. The description is below, but in addition to what that tells you about the session, each attendee got a copy of the Competency Index and had a chance for some constructive back and forth.
“Competencies: Buzzword or Stepping Stone?
You’ve heard the buzz about competencies, but do you have a clear idea of how to use them for your library? You may be wary of starting down this path without knowing how to define competencies, much less how to implement them. It’s time for straight talk about competencies. How can they help you achieve your staff development goals? Learn more about strategies and resources from libraries that have been there. We can help make your journey far smoother!”
While that session is over now, you can find much of the info we discussed, including past events with Betha and Michael and some of the folks who have actually *used* competencies to help their libraries and staff grow and thrive here: http://www.webjunction.org/competencies.
Additionally, on the topic on competencies we’ll also be having a couple more live events here at WebJunction about competencies before the year is up and you’ll be able to attend those as well, so stay tuned!

(Here’s Betha sharing some of here knowledge of Library Competencies-and cracking some pretty good jokes along the way).
While this is just a tiny taste of the great time had at WLA/PNLA by WJ folks, we hope it was fun to see and also hope that you know we are eager to help you and all our fellow library professionals learn whatever helpful info we can. And hopefully we’ll see you next time we are out and about!
Many thanks to everyone who attended the WebJunction presentation today at IFLA. This presentation was part of a joint session of the Knowledge Management, Continuing Professional Development and Workplace Learning, and Information Technology sections.
Visit the IFLA site to read all of the papers that were presented in Session 107 — it was wonderful to be part of a session that included examples of knowledge management and staff training projects from around the world.
Here’s to Maurice Coleman for providing a virtual update from ALA, especially precious to those of us watching from afar…who knows how he found time to upload the more than 20 videos he captured at the WebJunction-sponsored Learning RoundTable Training Showcase, but thank you Maurice!
Here are some highlights in the video showcase:
If you’re not a member of ALA’s Learning Roundtable, this set of videos will surely inspire you to get involved!
And we were pleased to hear that Betha’s session with Sandra Smith went well, all about Building with Competencies. Their slides and resource handout are now available on WebJunction.
Safe travels to all who will be traveling this week!
WebJunction’s Calendar is filling up with webinars! Join us in the coming months to explore everything from the Federal Workforce System to digitization & preservation, and from trustees to orienting new staff virtually.
Next Thursday’s webinar, Expanding Your World Through Web Conferencing, will showcase success stories of library staff who are using web conferencing tools to host virtual conferences, produce e-learning activities, collaborate with remote staff, and host virtual meetings. As budgets tighten and as technologies improve, more and more staff are gathering together both online and blended with face2face settings to learn from each other and to get work done. Come hear about the benefits of meeting virtually and learn how a variety of web conferencing tools are being integrated with other technologies and in other settings to overcome both cost and distance. Join panelists Karen Burns, Cindi Hickey and Jennifer Peterson on Thursday, July 1 at 1:00 pm Eastern, for a session filled with experience and expertise in online engagement!
And speaking of online conferencing, mark your calendars for WebJunction’s second online conference coming December 1 & 2 focused on Serving the 21st Century Patron. See you online!